


Cradling the Sun

by cuubism



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood and Injury, Depression, Fluff, Gore, Heavy Angst, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Alec Lightwood, Hurt Magnus Bane, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Magic Loss, Monster of the Week, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Protective Alec Lightwood, Self-Harm, Sort Of, Suicidal Thoughts, Tenderness, Touch-Starved, Yearning, field medicine, magnus in glasses, unnecessarily long scenes of treating each other's wounds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:07:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26177725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuubism/pseuds/cuubism
Summary: Alec’s known for a long time that Magnus is a hard person to hold. He’s so much—so much power, so much energy, so much brilliance, so much love. He shines so bright he’s hard to even look at directly, never mind try to hold in one set of hands.Now that Magnus himself is losing his grip on all of that, well. Alec will just have to hold him a little bit tighter.***This—them—it means something to Magnus. It might mean something monumental, something so big and bright that he can barely hold it in his hands.It scares him a little, that enormity.
Relationships: Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Comments: 53
Kudos: 191
Collections: Malec Discord Mini Bang 2020





	Cradling the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> please please check out the incredible fanmix made for this fic by [jillyfae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jillyfae/pseuds/jillyfae)!! ([spotify](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4mcjiSSSNaPJ6dnzP2RxKJ?si=FnyfwZJpTZ-R3iKtxm0OwQ) | [youtube](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvJ15v-gqS2fB8GPm2oLx9urB3QYf2git))  
> highly recommend listening while you read :) 
> 
> thank you so much [intezaarlily](https://intezaarlily.tumblr.com/) for beta-ing! 
> 
> This fic was created for the Malec Discord Mini Bang 2020 hosted by the [Malec Discord Server](https://discord.gg/5nBgEp8).

Magnus still finds himself in awe, sometimes, of how safe he feels when Alec holds him.

How they are still so new, still in between exploring and comfort, yet he melts right into Alec’s hands like they were shaped to his body, crafted specifically to set his skin alight.

Magnus looks at him, lying across from him on the bed. Alec is curled on his side, watching him with unmasked reverence, and Magnus can feel it reflected within himself—Alec’s awe at having Magnus here like this, getting to touch him like this.

Alec reaches out to run a curious finger along the line of Magnus’s throat, pressing lightly at the marks he’d left there. Magnus can feel the resonance of suffocation in the touch, a memory of drowning, but still he trusts Alec to be gentle with him. 

“You’re so beautiful,” Alec murmurs, and Magnus lets himself bask in his praise for a moment.

The morning sun plays over Alec’s skin, setting his runes into relief. He looks happy and soft and relaxed, so different from the serious man Magnus had first seen in a darkened club that it almost hurts to look at him directly.

“And you, my dear, are a vision,” he says, and Alec smiles.

Magnus has had many lovers in his life, and so Magnus has found himself here many times in his life: curled in bed on the morning after a first time with someone, soft and warm and uncertain, craving closeness. 

But never has a first time spun liquid gold in his heart like this.

This— _them_ —it means something to him. It might mean something monumental, something so big and bright that he can barely hold it in his hands.

It scares him a little, that enormity.

They are still so brand new, and already what’s between them is so large in his chest he can feel himself splitting open with it. Relishing, even, in the shattering of his own ribcage.

He has always gotten in too deep, been too much to handle, never known which parts of himself to keep protected and which to reveal.

He feels very revealed now, exposed in the naked hunger of his desires. The small points of skin where they still touch are like sizzling embers, he feels them branding him— _needy, desperate, wanting._

Wanting.

It’s taken Magnus a little while to convince Alec—his Alec who never takes anything for himself—that he can ask for whatever he wants. It’s taken a little while, but he’s gotten the hang of it.

But now, Magnus finds himself here. Wanting, and unable to ask.

_He’s_ supposed to be the one who knows what he’s doing. The immortal one, the experienced one, the confident lover. But he’s never really been able to put that act into practice.

He always finds himself here: shaken to pieces by the light skimming of fingertips across his bare arm, the press of lips to his forehead. Shaken, and wanting more. Always wanting more, and not knowing how to ask for it.

Never has a first time woken him quite like this, woken that sleeping, wounded part of him that will gnaw and gnaw at his lungs until he’s given what he needs to breathe or he stops breathing entirely, whichever comes first.

“What are you thinking about?” Alec whispers, still ghosting his fingertips maddeningly across Magnus’s skin.

“Oh, you know,” Magnus says vaguely. And then never continues, because he doesn’t, in fact, know. He’s thinking about pulling Alec’s hand off his arm and wrapping it around himself instead. He’s thinking about burying his face in Alec’s chest until he suffocates.

“That’s not an answer,” Alec says, but he sounds good-humored about it. 

Magnus still doesn’t know how to ask for these things absent the explicit intention of sex. How do you ask someone to _touch you?_

“I’m thinking about you,” Magnus says, tapping Alec on the nose. The grin he gets in response makes his chest feel warm and bright. “I’m thinking about how alluring you look sprawled out on my sheets like that.” 

_“Touch me,” he might say, and Alec would ask, “why?” and Magnus would say—_

_“Because I feel physical again when you do.”_

“Is that your way of telling me you want to go another round?”

It’s not _exactly_ what Magnus wants, but the idea holds its own appeal. Alec _is_ radiantly attractive in the morning light. And it will give Magnus the chance to get his hands on him.

He reaches over to run a light finger along Alec’s bottom lip. Alec’s mouth opens slightly at the touch. “Oh, I don’t know. You think you have time before work?”

Alec’s eyes fall briefly shut at the reference to his own joke from earlier, but he’s grinning. _“Cheeky.”_

Then he’s tugging Magnus back on top of himself.

Magnus goes easily, limbs warm and liquid, tangling his hands in Alec’s hair. Alec’s fingertips land lightly on his jaw, and he pulls Magnus down to kiss him, bright and wet and golden. Magnus feels it along every inch of his skin and hums into Alec’s mouth.

Then Alec’s phone rings.

Alec groans. “Oh, for _fuck’s_ sake.” But he stretches out one long arm to flail for his phone on the nightstand anyway.

Magnus knows from the moment Alec starts listening to whoever’s on the line that they’ll be taking a rain check on this round. He can read Alec’s various Institute-related expressions by now, and this one says, _this is serious._

“Time for some post-coital demon hunting?” Magnus quips, rolling off of him. He misses the warmth of Alec’s skin instantly.

Alec grimaces. “Please don’t phrase it like that.”

He slides out of bed, and Magnus unashamedly watches the pull of his muscles as he stretches.

“Well, what would you prefer, darling? ‘Sex n’ Shadowhunting’? ‘A Tumble and a Rumble’? ‘Fuck and Fight’?”

That last one is, admittedly, not up to Magnus’s usual standards for innuendo, but he still succeeds in getting a laugh out of Alec. “Magnus, _stop_.”

Magnus pouts. “Make me.”

Just as he wanted, Alec leans back in to kiss him. Magnus opens his mouth to him, reveling in the soft slide of their lips, the last contact he’ll likely get for a while.

Alec groans as he pulls away. “Stop being so irresistible. You’re going to make me late.”

He seems almost startled by the boldness of his own statement, and Magnus grins widely at it. “That would be like asking me to stop breathing, my dear. I can’t do it and survive.”

Alec looks deeply besieged. He takes a few decisive steps away from the bed. 

Magnus slides out of bed and stands up, stretching in a deliberately languid twisting motion. “Well, where are we off to?” 

Alec blinks at him. “Are you coming?” He sounds surprised, but not unhappy about it.

Magnus almost says something stupid like, _I could just from looking at you_ , but restrains himself.

“I don’t have any clients. I’ll be bored without you here.” He doesn’t say that he worries about Alec constantly when he’s not in his sight, that he’d rather be there himself to prevent any demon from getting its claws in him.

Alec’s lips quirk up. “Aw, you need me to entertain you?”

Magnus steps closer, runs a finger slowly down Alec’s bare chest. He kisses Alec’s shoulder. “Mmhmm. And in return, I’ll entertain you _very well_ later.”

Alec looks at him, gaze dark with want, and Magnus almost thinks he’ll tempt him back to bed. But Alec takes his duty seriously, so he merely leans in to kiss Magnus’s forehead, hands cradling his face.

“It’s a deal.” 

Magnus is bleeding.

They’re in the middle of a mission debrief, and all Alec can focus on is that _Magnus is bleeding._

It’s not a serious wound. Magnus is standing, attentive, doesn’t even look particularly tired other than the slight sag in his shoulders from the overuse of his magic. It’s not serious.

Alec can’t stop staring at it.

From across the room, Magnus feels Alec’s eyes on him and looks up, meeting his gaze. He cocks an inquisitive eyebrow.

Alec gestures to the gash on his forearm. 

Magnus looks down at it, then shakes his head, makes an _it’s nothing_ gesture.

_But if it’s nothing_ , Alec thinks, _why hasn’t he healed it?_

“Alec, is that all?”

Alec blinks back to attention. Izzy has finished her analysis of the mysterious new demon species they’d encountered, and everyone is now waiting for him to give any final updates or dismiss them.

“Thanks for that analysis, Iz. We’ll keep looking into it. I want everyone to fill out a brief report detailing your memories of the patrol so we can start compiling some data. After that, you’re free to take the rest of the day off.”

The Shadowhunters disperse, and Alec makes a beeline across the room for Magnus.

“You’re hurt.” Up close, the gash is ugly, a long, jagged line splitting his skin, the edges of the wound crusted with blood and ichor. Alec takes Magnus’s arm gently in his hands. “Why didn’t you tell me you were hurt?”

“It’s nothing. Barely a scratch.” Magnus’s voice is soft and low, the threads of tiredness in it revealed only to Alec. He lets Alec manhandle him. “The real casualty is my shirt. It was rather expensive.”

“I’ll buy you a new one,” Alec says. He examines the wound more closely. It’s still bleeding sluggishly, seeping into the silk of Magnus’s shirt. “If it’s nothing, then why haven’t you healed it?”

Magnus casts a furtive glance around at the Shadowhunters still lingering in Ops. “Not here. Do you have much work left to do?”

Alec decides right then that if he does, it can be done at the loft. “No. Let’s go.”

Magnus stumbles a little as they land from their portal, waving away Alec’s concern as he does. “Just tired.”

“Magnus, please”—Alec follows him as he heads for his apothecary—“heal yourself. Are you low on magic? Do you need my strength? Or I can call Cat?”

“Darling.” Magnus lays a hand on his arm. “I appreciate the concern, but I’m quite alright. My magic’s merely reacting to the venom. I can’t heal the wound until I extract it. Which I am doing now.”

He starts pulling jars off the apothecary shelves.

“You couldn’t say that at the Institute?”

Magnus smiles wryly, a glint in his eyes. “It’s best not to reveal weaknesses among those who could become enemies.”

Right. Of course. Alec feels like an idiot.

“Wait— _reacting?_ Reacting how?”

Magnus ignores him in favor of measuring out half a teaspoon of what looks like _human teeth_ into a small stone bowl. He picks up a pestle and begins grinding them into powder with quick, strong motions. “Fetch some wet towels from the bathroom, will you, dear? And a bottle of vodka.”

Alec rushes across the loft to grab them, and it’s only as he’s skidding to a stop in the bathroom that he realizes.

_This is the first time he’s seen Magnus bleed._

He’s seen Magnus tired and low on magic. He’s seen Magnus knocked down during fights. He’s seen Magnus bruised. He’s feared for Magnus’s life before.

But he’s never actually seen him _bleed._

It has him almost shaking, this knowledge that the boundary of Magnus’s body can be so easily torn open, that for all his immense reserves of power Magnus is still essentially—

—killable.

_It’s a minor wound,_ Alec reminds himself frantically, _he’s going to heal it. He_ can _heal it._

But Alec resolves that it won’t happen again.

He returns to the apothecary with Magnus’s materials bundled in his arms, places them down, and looks critically at the mostly-full bottle of vodka, then at the wound, then back again.

“Don’t you have, like… rubbing alcohol, or something?”

Magnus stares at the bottle for a long moment. “What? Oh, no,” he turns and winks at Alec, “this is for drinking. The poultice stings like a bitch.”

He finishes grinding up the teeth and tosses the powder into a cauldron, lighting a low flame underneath it.

“What are you putting in there?” Alec asks.

Magnus looks up at him, seeming genuinely surprised to be asked. “You want to know?”

“Yeah.” Alec’s curious, of course, but he’s also mentally taking notes so he can replicate the potion if Magnus ever needs it and can’t brew it himself. “Unless it’s like, a secret or something.”

Magnus smiles. “Hardly. It’s a common enough remedy.” He gestures to the cauldron. “The first ingredient is bone. It fortifies the mixture and acts as a binding agent. Bone of your own species is best.” 

“Wait, so those were _warlock_ teeth?”

“No, human. There aren’t enough growing warlock children to collect unneeded teeth from, so we have to make do. We are half-human, after all.”

“Wait—” Alec starts, the explanation triggering some half-forgotten memory, a Mundane fairy tale he had once heard and dismissed. “Isn’t that…?”

“Hmm?”

“Never mind.” 

Magnus’s lips quirk up, as if he knows exactly what Alec’s thinking, but he doesn’t comment, instead dashing a spoonful of vibrant yellow powder into the cauldron.

“Next, turmeric. It has natural medicinal properties. A dash of holy water—omit when treating vampires, of course—then activated charcoal—mix with water into a fine paste—” Magnus is talking faster now, his movements deft and sure as he adds ingredients, stirring with a thin metal spoon.

He picks up a geometric rainbow-colored gemstone, scrapes a sliver off with a tiny knife. When he drops it into the cauldron, the previously black mixture flares into a million colors before settling back down. “A few milligrams of bismuth crystal. Not _strictly_ necessary, but it helps to channel ambient magical currents. And besides, it’s always best for magical potions to be connected to the earth in some way.”

Alec watches intently as Magnus stirs for a few long moments, the potion shimmering under the apothecary lights.

“Finally,” Magnus says, “a drop of my blood.”

Almost faster than Alec can see, Magnus pricks a finger on the injured arm and lets a drop fall into the cauldron. Then he snaps his fingers and a flame burns along the surface of the potion, leaving behind a shimmering, iridescent blue.

_So much for replicating it_ , Alec thinks.

“What does the blood do?” he asks.

“Identifies the venom. Identifies my own organic material in contrast to it,” Magnus says. The corner of his lip twitches up. “Adds a little extra punch of magic.”

He carefully cuts his sleeve away, then summons a bottle of water and pours it out over the wound. Blood and ichor splash onto the carpeted floor of the apothecary. Alec had hoped the wound would look better once it was clean, but it doesn’t—it’s deeper than he’d thought, carving down almost to the bone. Alec can still see, in his mind’s eye, the long, curved claw of the demon that had done it.

While Alec’s examining the wound, Magnus is chugging vodka. “Hold my arm still,” he says, wiping his mouth. Alec takes a hold of Magnus’s forearm, and then Magnus is gathering a large glob of the poultice and smearing it deep into the wound.

He hisses at the sting, and his arm flinches in Alec’s grip, fingers flexing. Alec doesn’t let him go, but he does shift one of his hands to intertwine his fingers with Magnus’s. 

They stand like that for a long moment, Magnus’s eyes clenched shut as the poultice sucks the venom from his veins, Alec’s eyes focused on Magnus’s face, looking for any signs of distress that go beyond the sting of healing.

Magnus’s eyes pop open as he gasps, his hand relaxing in Alec’s grip. “That should be sufficient.” His voice is a bit strained, and Alec doesn’t let go of his hand as Magnus pours the rest of the water over the wound, washing the blue gunk onto the carpet.

Alec looks critically at the mess. “You know, we could have done this in the bathroom.”

Magnus waves this away. “I’ll take care of it later.”

He hovers his hand over the wound, magic flaring to life at his fingertips and dipping into the gash, seeking out the torn edges of his flesh. Alec watches carefully as he works, watches the magic hover and whirr, watches the veins stand out on the back of Magnus’s good hand as it trembles.

Watches as nothing happens.

“Magnus.” He hears the alarm in his own voice.

“Just give me a minute.”

Magnus keeps working, arm shaking more violently with the strain. Sweat beads on his forehead. Magic swirls around his hand as the increasingly thick tang of it hangs in the air around them. The gash in his arm stays as it is, bubbling with blood. 

“Magnus.” Alec takes gentle hold of his wrist, stilling its shaking. “Stop. It’s not working.”

Magnus stops, staring down at the wound. “The venom is gone,” he says quietly. “My magic should be able to heal it now.”

He doesn’t voice his concern that it can’t, but Alec hears it anyway. “I’ll bandage it for you,” he says. “Come on.” And he leads Magnus, who’s uncharacteristically quiet, across the loft to the bathroom, pulling the first aid kit down from its shelf.

As Alec lays out his materials along the sink, Magnus finally says, “I can do this myself, you know.”

“With one arm?” He puts no heat in his words, and Magnus sighs. “Just let me do this for you,” Alec begs. “Please.”

He’s been itching to since first seeing the injury, to just do something, _anything_ to help. To get his hands on Magnus’s skin and staunch the flow of blood.

It’s still trickling, running over his wrist and dotting the floor tiles. Magnus looks down at it, and then nods, and Alec presses a sterile pad to the wound to soak up the blood.

Magnus is still as Alec discards the bloodied pad, but he flinches when Alec pulls a needle and thread out of the first aid kit.

“It needs stitches,” Alec tells him gently, “or do you disagree?”

Magnus shakes his head. “No, I just— oh, never mind, just get on with it.”

“Why don’t you sit down.” Alec guides him over to sit on the closed toilet seat and kneels between his legs, not missing the way Magnus sort of collapses rather than sits. “It’s okay,” he tells him, “I’ll be quick. You can rest soon.”

Magnus stares at Alec wordlessly, eyes wide and dark. Something’s shifted in the way Magnus is looking at him, something disbelieving and wondrous breaking open in his gaze, but he doesn’t comment, just nods once.

“Hold onto my shoulder,” Alec orders, and Magnus grips it with his good hand, and Alec dips the needle into his skin.

Alec isn’t normally squeamish about field medicine, but the subtle flinches of Magnus’s arm, combined with his death grip on Alec’s shoulder, make him want to sprint out of the room and hurl. Knowing he’s helping doesn’t really help at all.

He works as quickly and efficiently as possible, but by the end Magnus is still crumpled against his side, head tucked into the curve of Alec’s shoulder in a rare display of unmasked pain. His breath on Alec’s throat is wet and ragged.

“You with me?” Alec asks, and Magnus nods. Alec wraps his arm with swift, gentle movements, not wanting to jostle him any further. Every time his fingers brush his bare arm, Magnus’s skin jumps, though whether due to lingering pain, or something else, Alec can’t tell.

He tapes off the bandage and picks up Magnus’s hand, pressing a kiss to his palm. “All set.”

Magnus finally pulls his head away from Alec’s shoulder and looks down at his arm. “Skillful work, Alexander,” he says, voice a little shaky. He clears his throat, and his next words are steadier. “Thank you.”

“No need to thank me,” Alec says. “Let’s get you up so you can rest.”

They manage to stand and start for the door, but Alec stops as he suddenly realizes something. “Shit.”

“Something the matter?”

“No, it’s just— we’re _disgusting”_ —they’re still in the clothes they’d fought in, splattered in mud and grime—“but if we shower, it’ll mess up your bandage.”

Magnus looks back at the shower as if he’d rather dig a hole in the ground and crawl into it than take one step back the way they had come. Then he snaps his fingers and they’re both clean and in comfortable clothes.

_“Magnus.”_

Magnus has sagged a little more, but he’s still standing, blinking tiredly at Alec. “You were the one who wanted me to rest.”

“Yeah, but— oh, never mind. Come on.”

He gets Magnus into bed, a little concerned by how exhausted this relatively small wound has made him. Magnus looks up at him from his pillow, eyes already slipping shut. “I suppose you have to get back to the Institute?”

“What? _Angel_ , no, I was going to stay. If that’s alright.”

Magnus looks a little more alert now. He nods, beckoning Alec forward with his uninjured hand. “Of course. Please, stay.”

Alec doesn’t need to be told twice. He turns out the light and slides under the covers. Magnus watches him do it. He looks uniquely vulnerable in the low light coming in from the window, his hair soft and falling over his eyes, arms tucked in against his chest. Alec wishes it didn’t take an injury for him to get to see Magnus without some of his walls.

“Come here,” he tells him. Magnus blinks.

“What?”

“Come _here_.” Alec gets a hold of his arm and tugs. “You know you want to.”

Magnus doesn’t deny it. Alec tugs again, and this time Magnus goes, tucking himself in against Alec’s chest, mindful of his injured arm. Having the weight of Magnus’s body against him settles just a little of that fluttering sensation that’s occupied Alec’s chest since first seeing the gash splitting open Magnus’s skin.

“Get some rest,” Alec says, and Magnus hums, lifting his head for a moment to look at him, expression unreadable. Then he ducks his head back down against Alec’s chest and is quiet, and Alec loves him, though he won’t yet say it out loud.

Magnus dreams about it. The battle.

He dreams of it in fragments caught by the wind—Alec leaping in front of Izzy to block her from a descending blow; blasting a demon back to hell, and the inordinate amount of magic it had taken; pain blooming along his arm with the lucky snag of a long claw, the injury noticed, evaluated, and immediately forgotten in the rushing adrenaline of the fight.

In fact, he had forgotten it entirely until he’d been standing in the Institute later, his blood dripping onto the marble floor.

Magnus wakes in Alec’s arms, not in the frightened lurch after a nightmare, but in a more thoughtful headspace, something confused and considering. His mind is a tangle, going every which way as it tries to find meaning in the scattered memories of an equally scattered battle.

He feels this way often, in fact—like he’s wandering through fog, his mind skidding too fast to avoid blundering into the many obstacles hidden by the mist. But now, at least, it has a known cause: the problem he’s trying to solve, the clarity he needs to unearth from beneath layers of grime.

A problem found in the strangeness of the patrol, how the movement of the demons had been almost without pattern, their formless shapes hurtling around the Shadowhunters without ever seeming to make real contact—except, of course, with Magnus. How tired he had felt, afterwards. How tired they had all felt. It’s a tiredness that clings to him still.

Which is why Alec finds him sitting on the couch in the cool darkness of the balcony, lit cigarette balanced precariously on his lips, the fingers of his other hand drumming against his tucked-up knees in a steadying, mindless beat.

Alec sits down beside him, rests a cautious hand on Magnus’s thigh. His palm is warm in the cool night. “You okay?”

Magnus hums. “Just thinking.”

“What about?”

Magnus takes a long drag on his cigarette and thinks about how to answer. How to collect his diffuse thoughts and organize them for Alec’s steady and considered mind. He fails miserably. “Shadows.”

Alec doesn’t respond, just watches him, a question in his gaze.

“They were like shadows, those demons,” Magnus elaborates. “Hard to see and harder to catch. Blocking out the light.”

“Incorporeal,” Alec says, to which Magnus nods. “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that. They were really hard to banish. Like our blades didn’t work as well on them as they should.”

“And yet, no one got hurt,” Magnus observes.

“Except you.”

Magnus inclines his head. Perhaps, if it had been a more severe wound, he would feel embarrassed by this—being the singular wounded amongst a group of Shadowhunters of frankly varying competence. But he knows Alec doesn’t think less of him for it, so he lets it be.

“Is your arm bothering you? Is that what woke you up?” His hand on Magnus’s thigh has started up a steady rhythm, rubbing back and forth.

“No. Just thinking, that’s all.” He likes this feeling, Alec’s palm against his leg, the warmth of him bleeding through Magnus’s pajamas. The careful steadiness of it that so reminds him of Alec himself.

Magnus can barely see him in the darkness of the balcony, but he can still make out the softness in the lines of Alec’s face as he asks, “Your brain never stops thinking, does it?”

_When you touched me,_ Magnus thinks, _last night, when you touched me, all of me, when you made love to me for the first time—yes. It did._ He says, “Not really, no.”

“Yeah. Mine neither.”

He doesn’t speak again, and neither does Magnus. He just lets himself sit, warmed by Alec’s presence against his side, mind still whirring but brought back, again and again, to the grounding touch of Alec’s hand.

It runs like background noise in his head for the next several weeks, the mystery surrounding these demons. Why no one’s ever seen them before, why they were so hard to kill, why, despite all the magic he could pour into it, the wound on Magnus’s arm still had to heal with stitches and a scar.

But the demons don’t reappear, so his intention to investigate starts to slip in favor of more pressing matters.

Then Valentine activates the Soul Sword in the Institute, and Magnus forgets it entirely.

∞

Alec’s shoulder is injured.

It must be on his back, for Magnus can’t see any blood marring the black fabric of his jacket. There is, honestly, little to suggest to the gathered Shadowhunters that he’s injured at all—Alec is quite good, Magnus reflects with more than a hint of sadness, at tucking away the torn edges of himself to present an unblemished front to his soldiers.

There’s little, visibly, to suggest that he’s injured—but Magnus can tell. It’s in the subtle creasing at the corners of his eyes, the way he avoids using his right hand as he takes them through the analysis of the patrol that’s spinning before them in hologram.

Magnus hadn’t seen the demon get him during the fight, hadn’t noticed the injury when Alec threw his arms around him in the aftermath, checking that he was whole. 

He should have noticed, he thinks. He should have noticed. He didn’t.

Here, now, in the bustle of Ops, with the words of Alec’s actually-quite-important debrief sliding past his ears—he _really_ should be listening, shouldn’t he—Magnus notices.

He sees Izzy eyeing Alec from across the table and knows she’s picked up on it, too. He meets her gaze and nods at Alec. _I’ll take care of him_. Izzy visibly relaxes, giving him a soft smile before turning her attention back to Alec’s briefing, seemingly recognizing that if anyone can get Alec to take care of himself, it’s Magnus.

“Alright, everyone, you have your assignments,” Alec’s saying, and Magnus snaps back to attention. “Dismissed.”

He waits for the Shadowhunters to leave, stoic “Head of the Institute” expression firmly in place, before turning a softer look on Magnus.

“Want to get out of here?”

“Gladly.”

“Alec,” Izzy interrupts, grabbing him by the arm. She gives him a significant look. Alec gives her one right back.

What follows is a minute-or-so of silent communication that Magnus can only partially understand. The Lightwood siblings have their own language that he’s not entirely fluent in.

To the best of his knowledge, it goes something like:

Izzy: _if I catch you in here again before you’ve rested, I’m grounding you._

Alec: _you can’t_ ground _me. I’m your older brother!_

Izzy: _watch me_ (conveyed with a head tilt and a smirk, and a glance in Magnus’s direction). _I’ll enlist Magnus._

Alec: _fine, whatever_ (conveyed with an eye roll).

“Enjoy your day off!” Izzy crows as she prances away. “Bye, Magnus!”

Magnus watches her go, lips curling in amusement. Alec huffs and takes him by the arm, guiding him towards the exit. His touch is gentle in contrast with his clear irritation.

“Your sister is a force,” Magnus observes mildly.

“A force for evil,” Alec says, but there’s no heat in it.

“In that case, count me in for the Evil Squad, because I wholeheartedly agree with her.”

“The ‘Evil Squad’?” Alec’s lips are twitching, which Magnus counts as a win. “What does the _‘Evil Squad’_ do?”

“Shopping,” Magnus says as they make their way through the Institute’s busy corridors. “Poking around at dead bodies. Recently we’ve been watching _Love Island_ , but to be honest, that show does little but kill my brain cells, and you know I already have vodka for that. But of course”—he pats Alec’s hand where it’s still wrapped around his arm—“our primary activity is harassing our favorite person until he takes better care of himself.”

Alec sighs. “Look, I know what you’re thinking. But I already tried an _iratze_. It didn’t work. It’s not like I _want_ to be walking around bleeding all over the place.”

Magnus blinks, brain already running a mile a minute. This is the second time magical healing has failed after an encounter with this still-elusive new demon species. Once can be a coincidence. Twice is the beginning of a pattern.

Alec pushes open the Institute doors and they step out into the darkness of the front steps. Moonlight catches in his hair as he turns to look at Magnus. “What are you thinking?”

“Many things,” Magnus says, “but nothing coherent as yet. This is certainly troubling. It requires further investigation.”

“Yeah. I just wish we could get a good visual on these demons. Maybe then we could get somewhere. They keep turning into smoke as soon as you look at them.”

“Shadows,” Magnus says.

“Shadows,” Alec agrees. His hand slides down Magnus’s arm to take his hand, and he lets Magnus pull him through a portal. 

Magnus doesn’t let go of Alec’s hand when they land in the loft.

“I guess you’re going to make me let you heal this, huh?” Alec says.

“You know me so well.”

Alec obligingly shrugs off his jacket, grimacing a little as it tugs at the wound.

“Darling, just—” Magnus snaps his fingers and Alec’s shirt vanishes, sparing him the discomfort of tugging it over his head “—let me.”

He leads Alec into his apothecary, gestures for him to straddle the desk chair backwards.

“Let’s see what we’re dealing with here.”

“It’s not infected,” Alec says as Magnus starts prodding at the wound with gentle fingers. It is, as Alec says, clean, but long and rather deep, surrounded by indigo bruising as if the demon had body-slammed him as it dug its claw into his shoulder. Even amidst the chaos of the fight, how had Magnus not seen this happen? “I don’t know why the _iratze_ isn’t working.”

“It was the same when one got me, if you remember,” Magnus says. “That isn’t a coincidence.”

“I just wish I knew what it meant.”

Magnus knows better than to hope his magic will be able to heal this, but he tries anyway, brushing blue tendrils along the wound. Nothing happens, of course.

“Was anyone else hurt?” he asks. “Are they having the same problem?”

“No one else got hurt. Just me.”

_Again_ , Magnus thinks.

“It was going for you,” Alec continues quietly.

Magnus’s hands still where he’s cleaning the blood from Alec’s shoulder with a damp cloth. “Excuse me?”

“I didn’t want to say so at the Institute, but yeah, it was heading straight for you. Totally single-minded. I pushed it out of the way.” 

“You—” Magnus blinks, alarmed by this revelation. “You jumped in front of me?”

“Well, I wasn’t going to let it attack you. You had your hands full with another one.” Alec twists around on the chair so he can sort of meet Magnus’s eyes. “Any idea why it would go for _you?_ I mean, Izzy and I were both closer, but it just wanted you.”

Magnus is still stuck on the fact that Alec got hurt protecting him, and he didn’t even see it happen. “You jumped in front of me?” he repeats dumbly.

Alec turns around fully now, untangling himself from the back of the chair. “Of course.” He takes Magnus’s hand in his own and lifts it to his lips, kissing his knuckles.

He speaks so matter-of-factly about the matter, like this is just the way things are, and perhaps it is. Alec _had_ saved him from being attacked by a Circle member the first time they’d met. Perhaps a fundamental truth of them had been established in that moment.

Magnus finally manages to snap out of his trance. “Thank you, Alexander.”

“You don’t need to thank me.” Alec’s looking at him, still holding Magnus’s hand to his face, something threatening to break open in his expression. He swallows and reins in whatever it is. “What was I supposed to do if you got hurt, hmm?”

They’re not long past the near-cataclysm of the Soul Sword incident, and this fear is still stretched thin between them. Magnus tastes it in the air sometimes, the tang of premature grief.

“I’m immortal,” he jokes weakly. “I thought we’d been over that.”

Alec just shakes his head, like this is no comfort at all.

So Magnus tries a different tactic. “Hey,” he says, his voice soft, the humor gone. “I’m here. It’s alright.” He leans down to press a kiss to Alec’s forehead, and Alec sighs at the touch of his lips.

His eyes fall closed, and he reaches up blindly for Magnus’s face, cupping his cheeks in two warm palms.

It’s not enough, this touch. It’s not— it’s not _nearly_ enough, but Magnus has work to do, a wound to patch up before it heals wrong and affects Alec’s mobility, or gets infected, or worse.

Alec, apparently, has no such qualms. He tugs gently, fingers hooking around Magnus’s jaw and guiding him down until their lips meet.

_Stop, you’re still injured_ , Magnus wants to say, but the thoughts are swallowed by the heat of Alec’s mouth. He quickly forgets what he’s supposed to be doing and just leans in, letting Alec take him deeper.

The angle is awkward and hard on Magnus’s neck, with Alec still sitting, but he doesn’t want Alec standing up when he’s injured. So Magnus kneels instead, slipping between Alec’s legs. He braces his hands on Alec’s thighs, and the solid strength of them is comforting, a reassurance that his injury truly is minor, that he is whole and here.

Magnus feels caged in, but pleasantly so, Alec’s hands and legs around him, Alec’s intense focus a buzz along his skin, Alec’s lips gentle, pressing, asking. Since Azazel’s cruel body-swap, it’s been hard to let himself be held like this, to submit to Alec’s hands, no matter how much he craves the pressure of his touch. The whiplash between the desperate craving after their reunion on the steps of the Institute and the instinctive recoil after Alec had nearly killed his trapped soul had almost driven Magnus mad, for a moment. Before he’d found himself again.

It’s easier now, he thinks. And thank God, because he craves it. Has always craved it. Doesn’t know what to do with how much he craves it.

So he lets himself have it, for a moment, against his better judgement. Knees bruising on the floor, palms hot against Alec’s thighs, Alec’s body curving around him, his hands still cradling Magnus’s jaw like it’s precious. He bites at Alec’s lip, tugging it between his teeth, and Alec follows him, inexorably.

Then he leans too far and lets out a pained sound into Magnus’s mouth as the movement strains his shoulder, and Magnus thinks, with very little mental coherence, _right. Demons. Injury._

He pulls away.

“Darling,” he says, raising a hand to his bruised lips, trying desperately to rein his focus back in. It’s extremely challenging when he’s still between Alec’s legs, pressed up against him, when Alec’s eyes are dark and wide and his lips pinked from kissing. “We’re supposed to be treating your shoulder. You don’t want it to seize up, do you? How will you use your bow then?”

Alec blinks once, twice, as he comes back to himself. “Right. Right. You’re right.” He sits back, and Magnus climbs back to his feet, feeling a little shaky, but pleasantly so.

“Turn around again for me?”

And Alec does, once more straddling the chair.

“Do you have, um—” he has to clear his throat “—any thoughts on why these injuries are immune to magical healing, if it’s not venom?”

“When it was just my wound behaving that way, I thought it might be my demonic energy reacting to the demon’s,” Magnus says as he cleans the wound with a flash of magic. “It has been known to happen. Different strands of demonic magic don’t always play nice with each other.”

He summons a needle and thread, soothing a hand over Alec’s shoulder before beginning his stitches. Alec barely flinches as the needle pierces his skin, and Magnus isn’t sure how to feel about that. Grateful, if his boyfriend truly isn’t in much pain. Saddened, if he’s merely learned not to show it.

“But now that your angelic magic has reacted the same way…” he continues, frowning. “I’m not so sure. Pure angelic magic should have been strong enough to purge away any lingering demonic energy.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Alec agrees.

“I’ll keep looking into it,” Magnus says. “But I’m afraid we may not know the answer until we know what _kind_ of demon these are.”

“I’m guessing that goes for why they’re going after you, too?”

“Most likely.” Magnus finishes the last stitch and ties it off, then summons a bandage to tape over the wound.

“You’re all set,” he says. “And I know you don’t like to hear it, but Isabelle is right. You really should take tomorrow off to give this some time to heal.”

Alec sighs. “If I say I’ll work from home, is that enough of a compromise?”

“Will you stay on the couch and not move and let me ply you with tea?”

“If you’ll stay on the couch with me.”

Magnus smirks, realizing belatedly that Alec’s still facing away from him, and can’t see it. “It’s always my pleasure, darling.”

Alec tilts his head back at him, a smile playing on his lips. “Whatever you’re implying doesn’t exactly sound like ‘approved behavior’ for an invalid.”

Magnus grins and leans over his shoulder to kiss him, sort of half-sideways and upside down. He almost misses his mouth entirely. “No, it doesn’t, does it?”

It’s unexpectedly nice, Alec thinks, being cared for.

He is, as ordered, ensconced on the couch, tablet in his lap, several mugs of tea on the coffee table before him. (Magnus just keeps bringing them, no matter how many times Alec tells him that he doesn’t need to keep hovering over him.) Away from the constant emergencies of the Institute, he’s actually been able to get some paperwork done, the quiet hum of the loft a much more productive work environment than his actual office.

At some point during the day, Magnus had retreated to his apothecary to do his own work, but he reemerges now, carrying medical supplies.

He sits down next to Alec, announcing cheerfully, “Time to change your bandages!”

Alec can’t help but smile at him. This is a common feeling, but it’s especially strong now as he looks at Magnus who’s perched on the couch beside him, one leg tucked under himself, round glasses balanced on the end of his nose and looking just unreasonably excited about tending to Alec’s wounds.

Magnus eyes his smile with suspicion. “What?” he demands. “You’re not going to try to escape, are you?”

“Nope.” Alec obediently pulls his shirt over his head—it only hurts a little—and turns so Magnus can reach his shoulder.

Magnus still seems suspicious, but he starts un-taping the existing bandage anyway, his fingers deft and gentle.

It’s hard, still—letting someone care for him. Letting someone—even Magnus— _especially Magnus_ —touch the carved open parts of him. Even though Alec knows he’s being a damn hypocrite since he’s constantly trying to get Magnus to let _him_ help when he’s tired and injured, it’s hard.

But it’s nice, too.

Magnus’s warm fingers soothing over his sore shoulder, pressing magic into it even though it won’t help with healing, just to alleviate the pain. The intensity of his gaze as he devotes all of his focus to examining the stitches, to replacing the bandage and making sure it’s exactly right. The tickle of his wandering hands as he finishes his work and gets pulled away by the line of Alec’s neck, fingers dancing along his skin.

Alec stays still, barely breathing, lets Magnus do what he wants. Lets him drag his fingertips up into his hair, tangling in the strands, lets him tug at them in graceless exploration. Because he knows, even if Magnus won’t tell him, how hard it’s been for him recently to just— feel a part of his own body. To chase sensations instead of fearing them.

“Are you done with the bandages?” Alec asks quietly.

Magnus pulls his hands away. “Yes,” he says, “I’ll just—” And he starts to shift off the couch, and the thing is, that wasn’t why Alec was asking at all.

Alec turns quickly so he can catch Magnus before he bolts—catches him and kisses him, quick and warm. Magnus will kill him if he lies down on his injured shoulder, so Alec goes the other way, pushes him down onto the couch, kissing him unevenly all the while. Magnus goes with a laugh, yanking Alec down on top of himself.

He yanks hard enough that Alec loses his balance and drops his full weight onto Magnus’s chest. He shoves himself up onto his elbows, worried that he might have hurt him, but Magnus is laughing. “Don’t jump off the cliff if you aren’t ready for the fall!” he teases.

“Asshole,” Alec mutters, and kisses the answering cackle out of Magnus’s mouth.

He lowers his weight back down onto him, more carefully this time, and Magnus sighs under him, tugging him closer.

Alec closes his eyes to kiss him again. He doesn’t have to be able to see Magnus to know how beautiful he looks right now. He can feel it in the way he shifts under him, long and lithe on the couch cushions, in the way he spreads his legs so Alec can slip between them. In the softness of his silk shirt, cool against Alec’s bare chest, where it rides up to reveal even softer skin. In the way his hands start to wander again, burying in Alec’s hair.

Alec’s nose bumps against his glasses—Magnus doesn’t normally wear them outside of his apothecary, and must have forgotten he even had them on—and Magnus banishes them in a flash a magic. Something like disappointment flickers in Alec’s stomach. The glasses are a hindrance to kissing, it’s true, but they’re also, well… _cute._

Then the feeling evaporates as Magnus pulls him down, down, down, hungry for it, his mouth hot and wet and banishing any innocent tenderness found in his gentle exploration of Alec’s body.

Not that Alec minds. He’s always desperate to have his hands on Magnus, especially now, when he keeps thinking about how Magnus could have gotten hurt like last time. How it could have been _worse_ than last time.

Especially now, when Magnus is _looking_ at him like that, his eyes wide and dark, unglamoured. The scar from his run-in with their mystery demon peeks out from the edge of his sleeve.

Alec parts with Magnus’s mouth, ignoring Magnus’s whine of protest, to kiss it.

Magnus stills, watching him. “Matching scars, hmm?”

“I guess so.” He kisses Magnus’s wrist, mouthing at his pounding pulse. Magnus’s fingers curl towards his cheek. His free hand comes up to cradle Alec’s face, then tugs at his hair.

“Come _back_ ,” he whines, and Alec smiles. He moves away from Magnus’s wrist and kisses his neck, right under the hook of his jaw.

“Not what I— _meant_ ,” Magnus protests weakly, “but I’ll— ah— take it, I suppose.”

Alec hums against his neck, mouthing and then biting at the skin until Magnus is writhing under him, his hand fisted in Alec’s hair.

“Alexander— mmm— we’re feeling— ah— frisky today, aren’t we?”

Alec smirks and pauses his ministrations long enough to tell him, “After-effects of that Warlock TLC.”

Magnus looks down at him. “Do you mean to tell me that Warlock TLC makes you horny for warlocks?”

“Mmm, more like one warlock in particular.”

“I see.” A grin is tugging at Magnus’s lips. “Whatever shall we do about that?”

“I seem to recall you suggesting some ‘activities’ last night,” Alec says.

“Alexander! I would never suggest such a thing to a man who’s injured.” He pokes at Alec’s shoulder. “However, if _you’re_ suggesting it…”

Alec just kisses him again, on the lips like he wanted, reaching up to tangle a hand in Magnus’s hair. He really likes messing it up, now that he knows he’s allowed to, likes the way the longest strands slide through his fingers, becoming loose and fluffy in his hands. And Magnus seems to like it, too, based on the way he’s humming under Alec’s touch.

Magnus breaks the connection of their lips with a gasp. “Actually, can we, um. Postpone ‘activities’ for later?”

“Hmm? Yeah, of course, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, I just—” Magnus looks away over Alec’s shoulder, tugging at his ear. “Will you just—kiss me, instead? It feels like it’s been a long time since you’ve—kissed me, like that.”

He’s referring to the tension between them after the body-swap. Alec still remembers how initially Magnus had shied away from his touch, and how much that small action, however justifiable, had hurt them both.

The way that whole situation shook out was entirely Alec’s fault, and remorse for it still curls around his heart. Whatever Magnus wants, he’ll get.

So Alec kisses him, long and deep, but not moving towards anything more, just feeling the wet warmth of his lips, the tug of his ever-moving hands. Magnus may think Alec’s just doing this to make him happy, but truthfully Alec loves this as much as he does—the slow and unintentioned movement of their bodies against each other, feeling and kissing just for the pleasure of it, no goal in mind.

The midday sun cascades over them, draping everything in syrupy warmth and brightness, and Magnus hums happily against Alec’s lips.

And Alec thinks, _I want to stay here, with you, always._

∞

“Alec, get down!” 

Alec dives to the pavement as a demon careens through the space he was just standing in and meets Izzy’s staff in a flurry of ash.

“Thanks!” he yells in her direction as he lurches to his feet and back into the melee.

The demons are swirling plumes of smoke on the Institute steps, whirling wildly around the Shadowhunters. Alec stays still and watches for a moment, desperate to pick up on some kind of reason to their movements, because this is the third time they’ve fought these things and they still have no idea what the hell they even _are._

And, Angel’s sake, they don’t have _time_ for this right now. Valentine and Jonathan are still at large, the Soul Sword is missing, the Accords are on the verge of shattering to pieces, and Magnus is—

Magnus is—

Alec would give almost anything for this not to be happening right now.

Another demon comes after him, spinning wildly, and Alec slashes savagely at it with his seraph blade. Smoke solidifies into flesh as it impales itself on the adamas, but it explodes into dust before he can get any idea what it really looks like.

Alec grits his teeth and growls. There are still so _many_ of them.

“Behind you!” Jace yells from across the street. Alec spins around to find another cloud of smoke whizzing at him with blistering speed. He’s ready for it, though—he raises his blade and waits for it to impale itself. For all their unpredictability, this particular strain of demons isn’t very smart.

As expected, it slams straight into the tip of his blade, smoke particles congealing into dripping flesh—but it doesn’t disintegrate. It keeps _moving_ , flying forward until the entire blade is buried in its flesh and there’s nowhere else for it to go but right into Alec’s chest.

They both hurtle to the pavement, the demon crashing down onto Alec’s torso. It’s _heavy_ —there’s no sign of the smoke-body, this is all flesh—and its touch burns his skin like acid, even through his clothes.

For the first time, Alec gets a good look at the thing he’s been trying to fight for months.

It’s smaller than he expected, many-jointed and dripping, its skin sliding off its bones like it was never glued on properly. It has many claws and many teeth, but this is no surprise—what is surprising is the wandering, confused sort of look in its eye. He’s not used to lesser demons expressing any emotion other than blind killing rage.

Its chest heaves around his blade, breath huffing in his face. Its breath is _cold,_ as is the ichor that drips down his wrist and burns his skin. What kind of demon is cold like that?

Alec can’t get it off. It’s way too heavy. But it doesn’t seem to want to attack him and merely snuffles blindly at his face. Alec shoves at it anyway. He’s not just going to wait for it to figure out what it’s doing and tear his throat out.

But before he can manage to free himself, a blast of very familiar magic throws the demon off. It shrieks as the blade slides out of its chest, then disintegrates into dust.

“Alexander!”

Magnus sounds agonized, which isn’t—that sound, that feeling, it doesn’t _belong_ to Alec anymore. He doesn’t deserve it.

Alec pushes himself to his feet, swaying a little before he gets his balance back. Magnus appears by his side, lays a steadying hand on his elbow. Alec lets himself have the touch for a moment before shifting away.

“Thanks for the assist,” he says.

Magnus blinks, clearly having forgotten himself for a moment, and then his expression shutters.

“Well, you certainly needed it.” His tone is cold, and Alec flinches. He’d forgotten how Magnus’s words could cut when he wanted them to.

Then again, he’d caused this whole mess by lying to Magnus. He deserves whatever Magnus can sling at him.

“You should go,” Alec says. “There’s no reason for you to be caught up in this.”

He expects Magnus to agree, but Magnus is staring at the seraph blade in Alec’s hand.

“Your blade,” he says.

Alec lifts it so they both can see. The adamas, which normally glows along the edges with angelic power when activated, is dull, the metal warped here and there where ichor drips from it.

“It’s dead,” Alec says in surprise. He can feel it—the blade is limp and heavy in his hand, no longer thrumming with the angelic magic that normally gives it its wicked edge against demons.

Magnus looks up at him, alarm temporarily banishing the cool dismissal from his gaze.

“Demons can’t destroy seraph blades,” Alec says, feeling dumb and out of his depth. “It’s supposed to be the other way around.”

“Duh,” says Magnus, but he looks genuinely concerned.

“Alec, look out!”

Alec spins towards Izzy’s voice in time to see the final demon swerve around her whip and careen towards them.

No, not towards _them._ Towards _Magnus._

“Magnus, move!”

Alec shoves him before he has the chance to move on his own, and Magnus hurtles to the side, stumbling on the steps. Alec steps in front of him, swinging his—useless, he remembers belatedly—blade into the path of the demon.

The smoke plume parts _around_ the blade and collides with his chest instead.

Claws and teeth congeal from the air as the thing rips into him, tearing open his chest. Alec suppresses a cry of pain as it drags through his flesh and hot blood spills down the front of his shirt.

_“Alexander!”_ Magnus yells from somewhere far off.

From even further away, Jace: “Alec!”

Alec spins, throwing the demon off, grunting as its claws catch one last time in his skin. In the time it takes him to summon his bow and aim, it’s already tearing through the air towards his head.

He fires. The demon’s amorphous body _swallows_ his arrow, like it had broken it apart into molecules and recombined them with its own flesh. Alec nocks another arrow, but it’s too late, it’s too close—

The demon hurtles around him and crashes straight into Magnus.

“Magnus!” Alec runs for him, but his speed is slowed by the fire in his chest. Magnus is on the ground, the demon a swirling mass of smoke above him, but he throws it off with a violent burst of magic that looks redder and angrier than normal.

“We,” Magnus growls, pushing himself to his feet and stalking towards the demon that’s hovering before him as if entranced, “are going to figure you out, once and for all.”

He doesn’t look injured, Alec notes with relief, but his jacket is singed and his hair in disarray, and he’s vibrating with an anger that somehow Alec doesn’t think is solely, or even mostly, directed at the demon.

The demon doesn’t try to flee or even attack as Magnus approaches and pins it with his magic. It just hovers, swirling in place, bits of flesh occasionally appearing amidst the chaotic particles. Magnus’s expression changes as he looks at it, taking on a quizzical bent, and Alec remembers the way the demon’s attention had felt on him, not vicious, just sort of… melancholy.

“What _are_ you?” Magnus murmurs, taking another step closer.

But he doesn’t get to find out. A blade erupts from the demon’s center, and it shrieks as it shatters to ash.

Magnus glares at Jace, who’s standing amidst the wreckage.

“What?” Jace protests. “Someone had to kill it.”

Magnus huffs and doesn’t dignify this with a response.

Alec wants to ask Magnus what he’s thinking, but he’s not sure he still has the privilege of Magnus’s thoughts.

_But—no_. Regardless of whether Magnus is his— even if they’re not _together_ , this is an important case that the Institute and the Warlock community need to be in sync on.

Alec takes a step toward him—and promptly stumbles as pain flares up through his chest.

“Alexander!”

Magnus catches him by the arm, and there’s that _concern_ on his face again, that concern that he looks like he’s trying to fight, that Alec knows he doesn’t deserve.

Jace reaches his other side and starts trying to draw an _iratze_.

“It won’t work,” Alec tells him.

Jace, of course, tries anyway, and predictably nothing happens.

“These wounds are impervious to magical healing,” Magnus says, peering at them. He picks at Alec’s shirt to reveal the gashes more fully, and his expression eases. “They’re not that deep.”

Izzy runs over to them. “Is he okay?”

“He’ll be fine,” Magnus assures her. “In fact, I’ll make sure of it.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Alec says quietly. They aren’t each other’s responsibilities anymore.

“Fear not, I’ll be certain to bill you. Come.” Magnus takes Alec’s arm and marches him toward the Institute doors. Alec has no choice but to stumble along beside him.

Magnus props Alec against the desk in his office while he closes and locks the door. When he turns back around, Alec is slumped over a little, a hand pressed to his chest, clearly more affected by the wound than he was letting on.

Magnus steps closer. “Let me see it.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Alec says again. He won’t meet Magnus’s gaze, that persistent frown tugging deeper at his lips.

“And you didn’t have to jump in front of me. But here we are,” Magnus retorts. _“Sit.”_

Alec hops up onto the desk so he can sit properly and no longer have to hold his own weight, and Magnus steps up to him, slipping between his spread knees. His stomach flips at their proximity, but he maintains his detached frown.

“Besides,” he adds, “I know from experience that if I let a favor go unreturned it will come back to bite me in the ass. Might as well get it over with.”

Magnus wonders if Alec will call him on his blatant lie— _obviously_ he’s helping because he still cares, Lilith damn him—but instead Alec just quietly says, “You saved me first.”

And before Magnus can think twice about the words, he’s biting out, “Don’t make me regret it.”

Alec flinches, and Magnus has to take a deep breath to steady himself before he does something truly regrettable, like doubling down or apologizing or begging Alec to take him back. He doesn’t _mean_ to be so harsh with Alec, it’s just so hard to be around him like this, when he’s still hurting, and when they’re not—

Magnus is frayed and worried and going a little bit out of his mind with stress and the only person he wants to soothe him is _Alec_ — but he can’t have him, so he’ll just have to settle for the next best option available to him in this moment which is—

himself. Himself and his own hollow, useless words that never go in the direction he wants them to when it really matters.

“Let me see the wound,” he says again, voice much softer this time.

Alec obediently pulls the torn edges of his shirt away so Magnus can see. He’s drenched in blood, and Magnus’s stomach flutters at the sight. He summons a wet cloth to begin to wipe it away.

Alec jumps when Magnus touches his skin, though he doesn’t pull away. “We have an infirmary, you know.” His dark eyes are fixed somewhere over Magnus’s shoulder.

Magnus glares at him. “Might I remind you that you and I are the only ones with experience treating this kind of wound? Do you want it to get infected?”

Alec doesn’t say anything after that, just lets Magnus work, twitching a little wherever Magnus touches him.

Magnus almost loses himself once or twice in the feeling of Alec under his hands. He wants this to be more than the clinical treatment that it is. He still remembers Alec cradling his injured arm in gentle hands, pulling him close to press together in bed afterwards when Magnus was still drained and woozy from the venom.

Magnus wants to hold him. He can’t.

Alec’s wounds are _still_ bleeding no matter how many bandages Magnus presses to them. He swipes at the blood more aggressively, and Alec hisses.

_“These. Damn. Demons,”_ Magnus grits out, pressing harder against Alec’s chest, feeling slightly frantic. He’s _still_ bleeding. _“Damn them.”_

Alec’s hand wraps around his wrist. Magnus stills under his touch, breathing hard. His pulse is hammering and he’s sure Alec can feel it in his fingertips.

Several sentences seem to dance across Alec’s lips before he finally just says, “It’s probably infected. Like your arm.”

This is, of course, extremely obvious, and something Magnus would have realized if his brain hadn’t just been going, _he’s bleeding, he’s bleeding, he’s bleeding._

Magnus snaps his fingers and a vial of shimmering potion appears in his hand.

“Is that—?” Alec starts to ask, but Magnus beats him to it.

“The same poultice I used on myself? Yes. Give me your hand.”

Alec offers Magnus his hand, palm up, and Magnus pricks his fingertip more aggressively than is probably necessary. He lets a drop of blood fall into the vial, then activates the poultice with a quick burst of magic.

As he smears it across the wounds, Alec grits his teeth.

“ _Christ_ , you weren’t kidding about that stinging.”

“Don’t move,” Magnus orders, “let it work.”

Alec stays still, avoiding Magnus’s gaze like it’ll burn him, and Magnus fully expects that they’ll finish the rest of this in silence. But then Alec says:

“The demon went for you again.”

When Magnus looks up from the wound, Alec is looking at him, his face dark with concern.

“You saw that, right? As soon as you were there, it just—swerved right around me to attack you.”

“Of course I saw that,” Magnus all but snaps, “it knocked me to the ground, if you recall.”

Alec frowns. “You’re not hurt, are you?”

“No.” Magnus steps away from him so he can pace, running a hand through his hair. “And if you’re waiting for me to tell you _why_ they want me, you’ll be waiting a while. I don’t have an answer. And believe me, I have been thinking about it.”

It’s crossed his mind that it might have something to do with Asmodeus. But Alec doesn’t yet know who Asmodeus is to him, and Magnus certainly isn’t going to bring it up now.

“It destroyed my seraph blade,” Alec muses. “But _how?_ ”

“Only incredibly strong demonic energy can corrupt adamas,” Magnus says, “and these demons were _not_ that. They haven’t even managed to kill a single one of your Shadowhunters.”

“Not for lack of trying,” Alec says, standing up with a grimace.

Magnus reaches for his arm. “Don’t get up.”

“I’m just going to go sit on the couch.” He makes his slightly wobbly way over and collapses onto the cushions with a pained sigh.

Magnus hovers in front of him. His instincts are screaming at him to touch, to soothe Alec’s pain with his magic, but he just twists his hands together instead.

“That still needs stitches,” he says.

Alec waves a hand, then clearly regrets it as the movement tugs at the gashes. “I can get Jace or Izzy to do it. You can go.”

Magnus doesn’t go. “I don’t think so.” He summons the first aid kit from the loft and sits next to Alec on the couch, trying very hard not to think about the last time he’d stitched up Alec’s wounds and how quickly that had devolved into desperate touches.

“Magnus.” Alec’s face is much closer than Magnus had thought, his eyes wide and dark. “You don’t have to stay.”

Magnus can feel the brush of Alec’s breath, the heat radiating off his skin. He wants to kiss him _so_ bad.

Instead, he prods at Alec’s shoulder. “Turn more towards me so I can see the damn thing.”

Alec obligingly shifts on the couch so he’s facing Magnus properly, and Magnus snaps the poultice away and starts stitching.

Alec goes a little pale as he works, his breathing uneven.

“It hurts,” Magnus observes, and Alec seems to consider his response before finally nodding. “I’m sorry.”

Alec offers him a one-shouldered shrug. “It’s not your fault.”

It is, sort of. The demon had been aiming for Magnus.

“Besides,” Alec continues, “I can’t help but feel like I deserve it.”

Magnus shakes his head. “Any Shadowhunter would have been bested. It’s not your fault it defeated your blade.”

“No, I mean…” he trails off, looking over Magnus’s shoulder. “You know.”

This is in no way a clearer explanation, but Magnus knows what he means anyway.

His voice rises against his volition. “You think this is penance for lying to me about the Soul Sword!?”

Alec shrugs again. The temptation to shake him until his brain cells start working is extremely hard for Magnus to resist.

“That’s not how this _works!_ ” he snaps, because if he doesn’t snap at him he might start crying. “I don’t want you _dead!_ ”

Alec meets in gaze in challenge. “Then what _do_ you want? Why are you still here?”

_I want to go back in time so you can choose not to lie to me_ , Magnus thinks. But everything he wants is always impossible, so instead he says, “I never leave a job unfinished. Stop interrupting and let me work.”

And he starts stitching again with more fervor than before, tugging at the torn edges of Alec’s skin.

Alec obediently remains quiet, and somehow that just makes Magnus angrier. He doesn’t want to be angry about this anymore, but he’s never had much choice in these matters. He’s angry at Alec. He’s angry at himself, for trusting, for expecting too much, for getting in too deep. He’s angry at the world for making it so that that one wrong had to be a breaking point, rather than something they could work through.

Mostly, he’s angry at himself.

“There,” he says as he ties off the last stitch. Alec can bandage his own damn wound. “We’re finished.”

Alec catches Magnus’s hand as he stands, seeming surprised by the action even as he does it, like it was merely instinct. But he doesn’t let go, just squeezes Magnus’s hand.

“Thank you, Magnus.”

_I’ll send you the bill_ is on the tip of Magnus’s tongue. Instead he’s caught by the warmth of Alec’s palm against his own and the memories of the way that palm fit against his jaw and over his heart.

He yanks his hand out of Alec’s grip, exhaling shakily as he crosses the room towards the door.

“Magnus.”

Magnus stops, apprehension and hope warring within him.

But Alec just says, “Take care of yourself. Please.”

Without looking back, Magnus says, “You, too.”

(When they tumble back into bed after Valentine’s defeat, Magnus presses a palm against the slightly raised scars on Alec’s chest, pushing magic into them like he’d wanted to do when they were fresh.

“It doesn’t hurt anymore,” Alec says.

And Magnus says, “I know,” and he does know, but it doesn’t stop his tears from spilling onto Alec’s skin.

And Alec pulls him close, flipping them so his body is blanketing Magnus’s, creating a grounding pressure. “It’s okay,” he says. “I’m sorry, it’s okay.”

Magnus kisses him like he wanted to do back then, long and deep and carrying all the pain he’s been holding onto these past few weeks, whining a little when Alec’s hands catch in his hair.

“I love you,” Alec says into his mouth, and Magnus feels desperately pathetic but he needs to hear that to know that it’s still true.

They abandon any further plans and Alec just holds Magnus close to him, and it feels good, Magnus thinks, to be held.

“I love you,” Alec repeats, his broad hands warm where they’re tucked around Magnus’s neck and cradling his head.

“I love you,” Magnus echoes, because he knows Alec needs to hear it, too.

His eyes still feel heavy and his heart is pounding up into Alec’s chest and he half-thinks this will all evaporate like one of their mystery demons dissolving into the air—but, for the first time in weeks, his brain stops skittering into the walls of his skull and he can just… _breathe._

It feels damn good to exhale.)

∞

It shouldn’t have been so much fun, breaking into someone’s house, but Magnus can’t stop the laugh that bubbles up in his chest at the memory.

_“What?”_ Alec demands from beside him, though his authority is belied by the amused tone of his voice.

They’re walking home from the Institute after purging the ley lines of demonic influence, and Magnus is leaning heavily on Alec’s arm, feeling a little light-headed from magic depletion—which is possibly also why he finds himself giggling like a maniac.

“You _‘dabble’ in ceramics_?” he quotes, and Alec groans.

“At least _you_ didn’t have to go upstairs. He has like twenty paintings of himself!”

“Fear not, I’m unfortunately _well_ -acquainted with Lorenzo’s particular brand of self-obsession.”

“I am so sorry to hear that.”

They continue on in comfortable silence, Alec’s arm wrapped around Magnus’s waist, Magnus floating along with a pleasant sort of tiredness weighing at his limbs.

Alec breaks the silence by asking, “Are you up for getting dinner out somewhere? It’s just, we both have the night off, and it’s been ages since we’ve gone on a real date.”

“I could eat,” Magnus says, and Alec turns a blinding grin on him. 

A grin which slowly fades as his gaze shifts to focus on something over Magnus’s shoulder.

“Shit.”

Magnus slowly turns around.

He recognizes the demons instantly, drifting along through a cross street in the incorporeal way that they have. The demons don’t seem to have noticed them yet, so Magnus takes a moment to observe their movements. This is the first chance they’ve gotten to see them outside the chaos of a battle, after all.

The demons move slowly, and close to the ground as if looking for something. As usual, they’re manifesting as plumes of translucent smoke rather than physical beings—though Magnus spots flashes of dark eyes or long claws occasionally resolving out of the mist.

Beside him, Alec is texting, presumably asking for backup. He shoves his phone back into his pocket and summons his bow to his hands.

“Magnus, you should go,” he says, eyes trained on the demons. “I’ll handle this.”

Magnus doesn’t even bother responding to that.

“I’m serious. We know they always go after you. And with your magic so low…”

Magic depleted or not, there’s no way Magnus is leaving Alec alone to face demons that can destroy angelic weapons, demons that have already injured him twice.

“Give me your blade,” he says.

Alec blinks in surprise, but pulls his seraph blade from its holster and passes it to Magnus, hilt first.

It lights up red as Magnus takes it, but if Alec is surprised by this, he doesn’t show it.

“As long as the demons don’t show signs of attacking anyone, we should wait for backup,” Alec says, and Magnus nods.

But it’s too late.

As if drawn by the appearance of their weapons, one of the demons turns toward them. Magnus can feel the weight of its attention even with its eyes still merely flickering in and out of being.

Alec tenses beside him, his bow at the ready, an arrow placed lightly on the string.

The demon drifts closer in an uncertain swaying pattern, as if blind and finding them by scent alone. Magnus holds his breath as it draws near, grip tightening on the hilt of his blade.

It stops in front of them, swiveling side to side as if it can’t decide who to attack.

Alec trains his bow on it.

The demon’s attention locks on Magnus.

Alec fires.

The arrow slices through the smoke of the demon’s body, shearing off into the distance, and the demon screams—

And then they’re surrounded, and Magnus loses track of Alec, and himself, in the chaos.

Demons swarm him in a cloud of smoke. Magnus slices at them with his blade, the adamas a glowing blur of red in the darkness. It fights him, angelic weapons always do, and he has to concentrate hard to keep control. His already exhausted mind starts to splinter under the weight of it.

His only indication that Alec is still alive and fighting is the occasional arrow whizzing past him. There are just _so many_ demons, and it doesn’t seem like their efforts are doing anything to diminish the horde.

A demon careens right for his head, and Magnus slashes savagely at it. The demon disintegrates as it makes contact with the blade, and when Magnus pulls the weapon back to himself, he finds puckering at the edge of the metal, damage like what had happened to Alec’s blade last time.

But he’s ripped from his examination of it by a clatter.

Alec’s bow has skittered across the street, apparently knocked from his hands by one of the demons, which is now circling around to come at him again. Alec reaches instinctively for his blade—

—which he gave to Magnus.

Magnus doesn’t spare a moment to think. He doesn’t think about his exhaustion, and he doesn’t think about how much magic he’d used to purge the Institute’s angelic core—he just summons his remaining reserves and throws all of it out in a wave that rakes across the battlefield.

The magic thrums through the demons, and they seem to still in the air as it ricochets through their cells. For a moment, they are almost corporeal, sagging flesh and sad eyes, and then they’re blown to pieces by Magnus’s raw power.

Magnus _almost_ has a thought about what that means, but before he can complete it, darkness rushes in at the edges of his vision and he’s falling, catching the barest edge of Alec’s distraught voice and the warmth of his arms before there’s nothing at all. 

When he wakes in bed, he feels so comfortable and warm that he almost wonders if it wasn’t all a dream.

But— nope. He can still feel the exhaustion dragging at his limbs, the hazy lack of awareness that always accompanies magic depletion and makes it so dangerous.

Magnus pushes himself up on his forearms, and immediately topples to the side as darkness crowds in on him.

His face lands right on Alec’s hip.

He looks up at Alec, who’s sitting beside him in bed and working on paperwork. Alec raises an eyebrow at him. “You okay?”

Magnus nods and, with Alec’s help, finally manages to sit upright.

A headache immediately begins pounding at his temples, and he wishes he could go back to the cocoon of warmth he’d woken up in.

Alec hands him a glass of water, and as Magnus sips it, he finally takes stock of his situation.

“Did you… carry me home?”

“Of course. I mean, you were unconscious.”

Magnus looks him over. He expected more panic, to be honest. “You seem surprisingly calm about that.”

Alec laughs. “Only because I called Cat and she said you’d be fine. You are feeling okay, aren’t you?”

“Just tired and annoyed at having our date ruined. Although on the plus side—” Magnus pokes Alec’s shoulder “—I’ve always wanted to swoon dramatically into my lover’s arms.”

Alec regards him with fond exasperation. “Well, wish granted. But I’d prefer if there wasn’t any more swooning of any kind.”

“As would I.” Magnus groans as a particularly sharp pain starts pulsing at his temple, and Alec’s gaze sharpens in concern.

“Are you okay?”

Magnus collapses against his side, tucking his face into the warmth of Alec’s collarbone. “I’m fine. Magic depletion is just unpleasant no matter how many times one has experienced it.”

Alec runs a hand through his hair and Magnus soaks in the grounding pressure of his fingertips. “You seemed like you were having a pretty good time earlier.”

“Yes, well, it’s like drinking, darling. A little makes you all warm and floaty, a lot just leaves you with a nightmarish hangover, regretting all of your life choices.”

“Can I get you something for it?”

Magnus closes his eyes and shakes his head. Alec’s fingers drag in his hair at the movement. “I’ll be alright. Tell me about what you’re working on?”

Even with his eyes closed, Magnus can picture the intensity of Alec’s gaze as he thinks. “I’m going over the mission reports from all the times we’ve encountered these demons. Trying to figure out… I don’t know. Anything.”

“Hmmm. Well, what do we know?” Magnus asks. “They can destroy your seraph blades, but they can also be destroyed _by_ them—sometimes.”

“They don’t seem to have any sort of leader or plan,” Alec says.

“They have some kind of corporeal form, but they either don’t, or _can’t_ , inhabit it on a regular basis.”

Alec finishes quietly, “And they really like to go after you.”

“Indeed. Why? Why do they like me?” Magnus muses. “Other than that I’m so charming and handsome, of course.”

“Of course.”

An idea is swirling around in Magnus’s head, loose and fragmented pieces occasionally congealing into a theory but breaking apart again before he can quite grasp it. The magic depletion doesn’t help, fogging his brain and blurring his recent memories.

“Magnus,” Alec says quietly, “do you think… it could have to do with your father?”

Magnus freezes instinctively, before remembering that he had told Alec about Asmodeus just that morning.

“It’s crossed my mind,” he admits, “but ultimately I think it’s unlikely. They aren’t Edomai demons, for one, and even if they were—my father, while he likes to play games, is ultimately very intentional. This seems like an incredibly roundabout and obscure way to get my attention—it just doesn’t feel like him.”

“Okay. That’s good, I guess.”

They lie in bed for a while longer, Alec continuing to pore over his paperwork, Magnus dozing off on his shoulder. When Alec shakes him awake again, bright midday light is streaming through the bedroom window.

“Hey,” Alec says, voice soft as if he’d just as happily let Magnus keep sleeping, “you want to get up and get some lunch?”

As if on cue, Magnus’s stomach rumbles, and Alec chuckles.

“Come on, I’ll make you something.”

He gestures for Magnus to join him as he slides out of bed, and Magnus does—

—and promptly falls over as dizziness hits him like a wave.

“Magnus!” Alec practically launches himself over the bed to catch him, but he isn’t fast enough. Magnus is already picking himself up off the floor by the time Alec reaches the other side of the bed.

“Whoa, easy,” he says as Magnus pulls himself upright, bracing on Alec’s arm. “Are you okay? Shouldn’t your magic have been mostly replenished by now?”

It should have been. “Just dizzy,” Magnus says, vision swimming, “it’ll pass.”

Alec looks worried. “Alright, well, you should eat something.”

He leads Magnus, still stumbling a little, over to the kitchen and plants him in a chair at the kitchen table.

Magnus barely notices it happening. He’s thinking about his magic. It’s still _there_ inside him—he can feel it curled around his heart, and it’s the only thing keeping him from fully panicking—it’s just still too depleted to use.

Even after almost a full day’s rest, it’s still too depleted.

Magnus knows his limits. He may not always _heed_ them, but he knows them, and the amount of magic he’d used should not have been enough to knock out his powers for a full _day_.

Which can only mean…

“Alec!” he yells.

There’s a clattering sound and footsteps, as if Alec had dropped whatever food he was preparing to run in and rescue Magnus from another dramatic faint.

But Magnus is already on his feet, dizziness be damned, and careening into the kitchen.

He catches himself on the counter, legs wobbling, but he _has_ to get this out, he is _not_ going to faint again.

“It’s the magic,” he says.

Alec takes him by the arm and pushes him to sit down on one of the stools at the island. “Magnus, _sit down—_ ”

“It’s the magic!” Magnus insists. “They want _magic!_ ”

Magnus’s brain is still foggy, and going every which way with implications and theories, and it’s harder than usual to articulate his thoughts.

But fortunately, Alec is smart, and he catches on.

“The demons are after _magic?_ ” he confirms, one hand still steadying Magnus on the stool. “Your magic?”

Magnus nods. “Or… any warlock’s magic, I suppose. I’m just the only one they’ve had occasion to fight.”

He remembers, with new clarity, the demon he’d fought on the Institute steps, how it had hovered before him rather than attacking as if spellbound by the touch of his magic. _Of course._

“And that’s why you’re so tired? Because they were…”

“Siphoning off my magic, yes. But don’t worry, it’s not permanent.”

“Why?” Alec asks. “Why do they need magic?”

“Can’t say, as of yet. I need to do some more research.” Magnus stands up to do just that, sways, and is immediately pushed back down by Alec.

“Right now you need to eat something. Here.” He places a bowl of leftovers on the counter and Magnus starts eating mechanically, mind already a thousand miles ahead.

Alec eyes him, and there’s a warning in his voice. “ _Magnus_. I can see you thinking.”

Magnus hums noncommittally.

“You still need to _rest_.”

“I’m a man of many talents—I can rest _and_ study at the same time.”

Alec sighs. “I’m not going to be able to stop you, am I?”

Magnus winks at him. “What do you think, dear?”

“Well, at least let me stay and keep you company.”

Magnus beams at him. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

∞

Magnus is wearing his glasses. He’s _outside the loft,_ and he’s _wearing his glasses._

It’s such a minor thing, but it causes a swoop in Alec’s stomach.

“Hey.” He sidles up beside Magnus where he’s standing by the central Ops hologram. “You okay? You’re…” he gestures to his eyes.

Magnus seems to shrink under the scrutiny. “Oh. Yes. My eyesight is just… not quite the same, without magic.”

Each new magicless hardship Magnus reveals is like a punch in the chest, and Alec’s not sure how much longer it’ll be before his breastbone cracks under the pressure.

First, it was the fact that he wasn’t sleeping. It took Alec several nights to be able to catch him in the act, his workload at the Institute preventing him from staying up with Magnus even when he would have liked to. When he finally caught him, Magnus reluctantly admitted that he had a hard time sleeping without his magic. Whether this was due to anxiety, or nightmares, or needing his magic to calm his mind enough to fall asleep, he didn’t say.

Then he started showing up in bed covered in bruises. For a brief, horrified moment, Alec thought he was doing it to himself on purpose—before he realized that it was the result of Magnus losing the additional balance and grace his magic had afforded him. Magnus was full of energy, and had a tendency to hurtle around the loft without necessarily looking where he was going—but his magic had always protected him, subtly moving things out of the way and instantly healing the bruises whenever he happened to make contact with the furniture. Now, he was careening into countertops and table corners, thrown off balance by the way his body moved without magic and unused to having to think so hard about where he put his feet.

Then, he went distant, lost in some liminal space between the vibrant past and the dullness of now. He didn’t even seem to be making an effort to stay present—Alec would often catch him staring off into the distance even though there was a book open in front of him, and when Alec called his name, Magnus would blink back, and he would smile at him, but his heart clearly wasn’t in it. In the time since he’s lost his magic, Alec hasn’t once seen Magnus pour himself into a project the way he used to do at all hours of the day and night, hasn’t once seen his melancholy diverted for more than a few minutes at a time.

Now, it’s his eyesight. His eyesight that he needs for brewing potions and reading ancient texts and every other incredibly detailed thing that Magnus does, and Alec’s not sure how much more of this he can take before he snaps and has to do something about it. 

Instead of saying any of that, Alec just silently makes the hologram bigger.

He lays a hand on Magnus’s lower back and addresses the gathered Shadowhunters. “A group of demons has been spotted in Red Hook. By all accounts, it looks like the same type we’ve been fighting these past few months.”

He spins the hologram to show another view of the area.

“Remember, according to Magnus’s research, the demons are attracted to magic and seek to absorb it. Demonic magic has the strongest pull, but they’re certainly not averse to angelic magic if it’s available. Remember your training: we attack in pairs. One will draw the demon’s attention, and the other will banish it while it’s distracted. Watch out for your partner. Is that clear?” Once everyone in the group nods— “Good. We leave in fifteen minutes. Dismissed.”

No one asks why Magnus is here if he can’t fight, but Alec can see the understanding and pity in their eyes, and he knows Magnus can see it, too.

“Well,” Magnus says, a fragile smile slipping through the impartial mask he threw on for the Shadowhunters as he offers Alec his hand, “shall we?”

They head towards the armory. Alec is honestly loath to let Magnus anywhere near this fight without his magic to protect him, even if he recognizes that Magnus is actually _safer_ without the magic lighting him up as a target. But he remembers how hurt Magnus had been when Alec tried to stop him from being involved in the Iris Rouse operation, and he doesn’t want a repeat of that when Magnus is already teetering on such a fine edge.

And besides, he had held his own then. He’ll hold his own now. And if he can’t, Alec will throw himself bodily between Magnus and anything that tries to hurt him.

Izzy equips Magnus with two non-magical blades. Alec honestly has doubts that they’ll do much against any demons, but he still feels better seeing Magnus carry them.

“Remember,” he tells him as they walk down the Institute steps, his voice as gentle as he can make it, “you’re just there to observe so we can figure out how to beat these things.”

Alec expects Magnus to bristle, but instead he just deflates. “I’ve no desire to be collateral damage, Alexander.”

He doesn’t sound… entirely _convinced_ of that statement.

“And I don’t want you to be,” Alec agrees, “so just—be careful? Please.”

Magnus doesn’t say anything, and that settles it. As soon as this fight is over, Alec’s going to figure out how to get him his magic back.

He doesn’t care what it takes.

The battle is worse than ever before. The demons seem to have multiplied in number, and without Magnus as a magical beacon, their movements are even more uncoordinated than normal.

Alec lets fly arrow after arrow after arrow. They all hit their targets, but less than half manage to banish one. The rest are just— _eaten_ by the yawning forms of the demons, the angelic magic a temporary balm for their starving bodies. His Shadowhunters seem to be faring a bit better, the team approach proving to be an effective method for catching the demons off guard. 

Alec can see Magnus standing off to the side, half-hidden in the shadows, studying the fight with a gleam of interest in his eyes that Alec hasn’t seen in a long while. He hopes he’s managed to figure out _something_.

Apparently, he has, because he starts walking towards the battle.

“Magnus!” Alec yells, even as he slashes at the demon that takes advantage of his distraction to come at him, “stay back!”

Magnus ignores him. His gaze is fixed on the swirling melee of demons, flickering from one to the next, cataloging how they dive for the seraph blades, how they shift from smoke to flesh and back again as they make impact.

“Magnus, get _back!_ ”

Magnus reaches Alec in the center of the battlefield. The demons part around him, and Alec wonders if maybe they can sense it on him, the conspicuous absence of magic. He wonders if it frightens them the way it does him, even if for a different reason.

“Alexander,” Magnus says as he reaches him, and never has Alec so wished Magnus had his cat eyes back because he looks so fragile like this, with his glasses and his chipped nail polish and his dark, soulful eyes resolutely looking anywhere but at Alec.

“I need to borrow some magic.”

Magnus isn’t entirely sure he exists in the world anymore.

Logically, he knows that he does, but lately he hasn’t been able to feel it. He feels like a shadow, drifting around his apartment without being able to touch anything, empty and unfeeling and half-asleep, and he’s not sure how much longer it will be before he disappears completely.

Standing amongst the swirling, incorporeal bodies of these demons, their confused sadness soaking into the air he breathes, Magnus feels wide awake for the first time in weeks. The air is sharp and cold around him, tangy with angelic magic, and for the first time in a long time he can breathe it.

Because he _understands_.

It’s like swiping away the congealed blood from around a wound—he can see the damage clearly now. The demons need magic. They need it like breathing. They’re suffocating, drowning, _decaying_ without it to the point that they’ll chase even that which will poison and kill them.

And Magnus knows how to help them breathe again.

Alec is staring at him. “You can’t use angelic magic. It’ll hurt you.”

Magnus shakes his head. “I may be mortal, but that doesn’t make me a mundane. My father was an _angel._ I can wield angelic magic. Especially now that there’s no demonic magic to counteract it.”

Actually, Alec’s right. It _will_ hurt him. But Magnus doesn’t care. He _has_ to do this. He has to be able to do _something._

“You’re sure?” Alec confirms. He doesn’t sound very confident.

“Give me your hand,” Magnus says.

Reluctantly, Alec does. He waits.

“You’re going to have to push the magic into me. I can’t pull it,” Magnus tells him.

“Right.”

Then Magnus feels cold rushing up his arm and into his body. It feels almost liquid, and he fights back a shiver as the power trickles through his veins.

At first, he thinks he was wrong, and he _will_ be able to carry this power with no consequence.

Then the pain starts. It’s a slow freezing, like ice crawling up his limbs, trying to weigh him down. And Magnus has no idea what holding this much angelic power will do to him long term, but he knows he can take it for now. And that’s all that matters.

“Magnus,” Alec says. He sounds breathless. “Let go. It’s hurting you.”

“I’m fine,” Magnus says, though it comes out through gritted teeth.

“Your _eyes._ ”

Magnus doesn’t know what he looks like right now, and he doesn’t want to. He has work to do, and he has to do it quickly, before he starts thinking about how good it feels to have magic filling that void in his chest again, even if it’s magic that burns him. He has to finish this before the magic starts to quiet his restless heart. Before he lets it quiet him permanently.

The demons have turned towards him, moths to their flame. And even if he doesn’t know what brought them to this state, Magnus _understands_ them. He knows their desperate, blind wandering. He feels the self-destructive beating of their hearts.

They want to burn themselves in the holy fire of his magic, and he’s going to let them.

“Magnus!”

Magnus stretches out his magic, and he can feel them. Not just the ones hovering before him, _all_ of them, spread throughout the city. All magic is interconnected, even angelic magic, and in the right hands, it can do anything.

_“Magnus!”_

It feels _so_ good to have this power running under his skin again, even if it’s the cold, syrupy magic of the angels instead of his own electric wildfire. Alec’s magic is powerful, more so than he probably knows, and Magnus wields it with the skill of a demonic heir, heedless of how it burns him.

_“Magnus!”_

He needs to free them. He needs to free them from their desperate search, even if he can’t free himself. So Magnus looks for a doorway, a demonic realm he can banish them to. Where had they come from?

He sends his magic in search of it and finds only a gaping hole in the universe.

Oh. That’s the problem. Their demonic realm has been destroyed. They have nowhere to draw power from. No wonder they’re desperate for any magic they can find.

_“Magnus! Stop this now!”_

He needs to work quickly. Find them a new home. Magnus scans the various demonic realms. He can feel their magical signatures on the currents around him, like distant strings being plucked. He just needs to find one that’s compatible with the demons’ own magical needs.

But as he looks through the realms, he quickly realizes it’s impossible. Magic, for all its interconnectedness, can be extremely finicky. These demons were born in a particular realm, one with a distinct magical signature. If their new home doesn’t match with their magic well enough, it will merely kill them slowly.

And none of them match.

Magnus has no choice but to destroy them.

He can still feel Alec holding his hand, pushing magic into him even as he begs for Magnus to stop. But that’s all very far away now. All that there is is what’s held in his hands: the thrumming threads of cool angelic magic, the entranced demons, the need vibrating in the air around him, a call for _magic magic magic._

Magnus thinks mournfully, _and magic they shall have._

He summons the angelic power within himself and blasts it outwards.

A wave of silver power thrums across the battlefield. Magnus can feel it echo through the city, catching demons wherever they lurk.

The ones before him freeze as the magic reaches them. It disappears into them, power dissolving into mist, and Magnus watches as they flicker to life. The lines of their bodies become more solid, decaying flesh tightening along bones, limbs straightening, and they start to glow along their edges, that sad wandering look in their eyes replaced by—

Magnus doesn’t know if lesser demons have the capacity for happiness, but that is how they look—almost happy.

Then they are gone.

Not disintegrated. Not blown to pieces like so many demons before them. Just—gone.

Like they’d never existed at all.

And for a brief, aching moment Magnus feels it in his chest: the desperate desire to join them.

Then his nose starts bleeding.

“Magnus!”

Alec pulls his hand from Magnus’s grip, and with it goes the power—and the rest of Magnus’s strength. He drops to his knees, blood pooling in his mouth, hands trembling. He has no idea what that much angelic magic will do to a semi-mundane, semi-warlock body, but he’s pretty sure he might be melting—oh, no, that’s just blood running out of his ears, fantastic.

Alec drops down beside him, hands cupping Magnus’s jaw. “Magnus,” he says, _“Magnus.”_

Magnus can’t really hear him properly. “I couldn’t save them,” he tells Alec. It’s the only thought he can focus on. “I couldn’t—” his voice breaks, and he sucks in a breath “—there was nowhere for them to go.”

“Okay, it’s okay,” Alec says, or at least that’s what his lips say. He pulls Magnus to him, bloody face and all, and Magnus curls into his chest, shaking. His glasses slide crookedly against Alec’s collarbone. When he blinks, blood spots the lenses.

“They just wanted magic,” he says. It comes out as a plea, or maybe a sob. “They just wanted— and now they’re gone. Destroyed. And did you see them? They were— _happy_. They were happy as I destroyed them.”

Alec pulls him tighter, one hand clutching in his hair. Magnus feels his voice through the vibration of his chest. “Shhhh, it’s okay.”

There will be no home for Magnus now, will there? There is— there’s nothing to be done for him now.

The thought sends a spiral of panic through him, and a cough pushes its way up from his chest, and then another, and then he can’t stop coughing, and he has to pull away from Alec because he can’t _breathe_ —

He tries to cover his mouth, and—oh. That’s— that’s blood. That’s definitely not good.

Alec is saying something. If Magnus is reading his lips right, he’s saying, _you’re crying blood_ , but that— that can’t be right—

The world spins around him, and suddenly he’s horizontal, head cushioned in Alec’s lap, looking up at a sky conspicuously free of demons, before the next cough forces him to turn on his side and press his forehead into Alec’s thigh as he convulses.

Alec’s speaking to someone. Magnus catches snippets of the sound, but his brain won’t process the information. All he’s aware of is the cold of the pavement under him, the warmth of Alec’s hand still in his hair, the pain slowly creeping in in the angelic power’s wake, and his racing mind saying over and over, _that’ll be you, that’ll be you, rotting from the inside out, fading away into nothingness—_

_—that’ll be_ you _._

Magnus is covered in blood. It’s dripping out of his ears, his nose, his mouth, his _eyes_ , like Alec’s magic had ripped him apart from the inside out, and Alec can barely concentrate on Catarina’s voice over the sight of Magnus’s still, bloodied, harshly-breathing form.

“Please,” he begs into the phone, “I don’t know how to help him.”

A portal opens beside him.

Alec barely hears himself dismiss the rest of the Shadowhunters back to the Institute before he’s lifting Magnus’s limp body in his arms and stepping through the portal.

Cat’s waiting for him in the loft. She startles when she sees Magnus. “What in God’s name did he _do?_ ”

“Used my angelic magic to kill demons.”

“And you _let him?!_ ”

“He said he could handle it!”

Cat snorts. “He thinks he can handle the sun. Put him there.”

Alec lays Magnus on the couch. Magnus’s arm drops limply over the side, his head lolling back at an unnatural angle. He looks terrifying. 

“I need you to make me this,” Cat says, and thrusts a piece of paper into Alec’s hand.

He looks down at it. It’s… a potion recipe. Alec doesn’t know how _he’s_ supposed to make a potion, but it must be possible if Cat’s assigning it to him.

He sprints over to the apothecary, pulling jars off the shelves as he reads the ingredients on the list. It looks—kind of complicated, actually. But he’s watched Magnus work for just this reason. He can do this.

One teapoon powdered graphite. One strand of lemongrass, coarsely chopped. Three tablespoons of olive oil. Stir and heat over a high flame until oil reaches the smoke point. Remove lemongrass, add one eagle feather burned to ash. Let sit in direct sunlight for two minutes—

Fuck! It’s nighttime! Alec spins in place, wondering what the hell he’s supposed to do, when suddenly he spots it: a jar on one of Magnus’s shelves labelled _sunlight._

How does Magnus have _jarred sunlight?_

Alec picks it up curiously. At first, he thinks the jar is empty, but then he realizes three tiny crystals are clustered at the bottom, glinting in the warm lights of the apothecary. Taped to the back of the jar is a note in Magnus’s swooping handwriting: _sub 1 crystal per min sunlight._

There’ll be time to question him about this later. Alec opens the jar and pours two of the delicate crystals out into his palm, then tosses them into the cauldron.

Light beams upward like the crystals really _had_ contained sunlight, and Alec has to shield his eyes. When it dies down, the crystals are gone, and the potion has turned a shimmering white color like freshly-fallen snow.

Alec looks at the last step. _Activate with angelic magic._

What?

Alec didn’t even know it was possible to use angelic magic to create potions, but apparently there are recipes floating around the warlock community that call for just that.

He remembers how Magnus had wielded the angelic power. How it had crackled from his fingertips much like his own, how his eyes had glowed pure white with the potency of it.

Is it really possible to use angelic magic like that? _How?_

He stares dubiously down at the potion, which is still glittering softly like it’s waiting for him. Alec lifts a hand over it, feeling kind of ridiculous, and wills it to _activate._

Nothing happens.

He grits his teeth and snaps his fingers like he’s seen Magnus do. _Activate! Do something!_

Nothing.

Alec thinks of Magnus in the other room, lying still, bleeding, and his heart clenches. This has to work. Magnus needs this potion. It _has_ to work.

He has to save Magnus.

Alec takes a shaky breath, hovering his hand over the potion again. His hand is trembling a little, but he doesn’t fight to steady it, just lets himself feel everything that’s inside. He searches deep within himself, where he imagines magic must live, if it lives anywhere.

_Please_ , he thinks, _for Magnus._

He wills the magic to rush up from his chest and into his veins.

There’s a _jolt_ through his body, and then a spark arcs from his fingertips into the potion. It isn’t much, but Alec still stares at it, dumbfounded. That was _magic._ Real magic, _outside_ his body.

The potion flashes and then settles back down to its usual glittering white. Alec picks it up, ignoring the lingering heat of the cauldron, and rushes into the living room.

He can only hope it’s enough.

When Alec skids to a stop by the couch, Cat doesn’t even look up, just lifts a hand for the cauldron. Alec places it in her palm and crouches by Magnus’s head.

Cat had been feeding a steady stream of magic into Magnus’s body, but she stops when she takes the potion. “This is going to purge the angelic magic from his veins,” she says. “I need you to be ready to catch it or it could whiplash across the apartment. Place a hand on his forehead.”

Alec lays his palm on Magnus’s forehead. His skin is ice cold, and Alec nearly pulls his hand away as a result.

“He’ll be okay,” Cat assures him, “it’s just a result of the foreign magic.”

Alec doesn’t feel very reassured. Even before this, Magnus was already weakened, already struggling. He may be the strongest person Alec’s ever met, but even he has his limits.

He pushes the thought away. Magnus has to survive. He just _has_ to. There’s no acceptable alternative.

“Are you ready?” Cat asks.

Alec nods.

Cat tilts open Magnus’s jaw and pours the potion into his mouth.

His body spasms as it touches his tongue, but Cat holds his jaw closed and strokes his throat, forcing him to swallow. As Magnus continues to shake, Alec almost wants to tell Cat to stop, let him go, stop hurting him—but he forces himself to stay silent.

Magnus convulses under his hands, he looks like he’s having a seizure—and a cold shock of power rushes into Alec’s palm. He gasps at the staticky prickle of it on his skin, the warmth as it travels up his arm and back into his body, but it doesn’t hurt—it’s _his_ magic, after all.

_His_ magic, that he can feel in his body in a way he never has before, a vibrancy that shimmers through his runes and across his skin, sparks at his fingertips, makes itself known before finally settling back somewhere in his core. Spots crowd his vision, it’s very hot in his chest, and Alec tries to breathe around it: the weighty power of angelic might, lightning and retribution.

Then all is quiet and dark.

Magnus is quite still on the couch, head tipped back, dried blood pooling in the hollow of his throat. Cat’s no longer hovering over him, but Alec can hear her moving around somewhere in the loft. The potion must have worked, right? If she’s left his side?

That, or—

Alec reaches for Magnus without even thinking to do it, needing to feel the thready beat of his pulse, the warmth of his breath, any subtle living movement that will banish this— this _corpse-vision_ from his eyes, restore the vibrant Magnus that he loves to this limp, damaged form before him—

He stops, hands millimeters from Magnus’s face, thinking with a pained jolt:

_Will my touch hurt him?_

_Alec’s_ magic did this to him in the first place. Will his hands burn Magnus’s skin, turn his lips bloody again? Will he— is it even safe for Alec to hold him?

If they had never met, would Magnus be here now: magicless, clinging to life? Alec doesn’t think so little of himself that he believes Magnus doesn’t really love him, or doesn’t value their relationship, but still, wouldn’t Magnus’s life be easier, if their paths had never collided at that raid on the loft? If Magnus had been in Paris, or Shanghai, or anywhere other than New York, fighting his own battles instead of constantly getting roped into Alec’s?

What, really, is their relationship worth in the face of all that Magnus has lost to keep it?

Cat appears at the end of the hall, snapping Alec out of his thoughts. She takes in his still-hovering hands as she reaches the couch.

“It’s okay,” she says, “you can touch him.” She hands him a damp washcloth. “He should be stable now. I’m going to brew him something to help him recover.” And she heads off towards the apothecary.

Alec clutches the washcloth in shaking hands. If Cat says it’s okay, then it must be so. She knows more about magic than he does.

She knows more about _Magnus_ , too.

Alec shakes himself, banishing any lingering fears from his mind—they can come later. For now, there is only this: taking care of Magnus.

He wipes the blood from Magnus’s face with reverent, gentle strokes. Magnus’s skin feels warm again under his fingertips, and Alec’s breath shakes as he feels it, the proof of life in the timid connection of their bodies. Magnus stays motionless, breathing evenly now, his expression slackened from its recent anguish to something resembling peace.

Having finished cleaning Magnus’s face, Alec places the washcloth aside and pulls the blanket from the back of the couch, draping it over him. He runs his fingers through Magnus’s hair, not sure whether to be relieved at his lack of pain, or unsettled by his unnatural stillness.

The guilt churns in his stomach regardless.

Magnus wakes to darkness and a pounding headache.

He doesn’t immediately know where he is, but something about the air around him feels safe so he doesn’t panic. He takes stock of himself in increments, like he’s rising from quicksand:

Fingers, stretching slowly across silk sheets. Muscles, sore and tingling with pins and needles. Warmth, a blanket or several draped over him. A tang in the air, the lingering remnants of some potion or other that he’d probably been made to ingest. More importantly, no more fiery cold in his veins, no more burning—

—and no more magic.

Magnus groans, ignoring the swoop in his stomach at the realization, and stretches out in the bed, slowly pushing himself up. It’s only then that he realizes that someone—Alec—is running fingers through his hair, the touch soft and grounding. Alec pulls his hand away as Magnus sits up, and when Magnus cracks his eyes open, Alec is cradling said hand to his chest, looking—guilty?

But he leans forward in the chair he’s pulled up by the bed, speaks softly. “How are you feeling?”

Magnus rubs at his temples, wincing. “Like I’ve been run over by a truck. Why is it so dark in here?”

“I just thought—your head. Your eyes.”

Oh, of course. Alec is always considerate of him.

“What was wrong with my eyes?”

“Well, they were bleeding.” Alec cringes a little as he says it. “It stopped a while ago, though.”

_“Fuck.”_

Magnus expects Alec to laugh at the outburst. He doesn’t. “Yeah.”

Alec looks uncertain in a way Magnus hasn’t seen from him in a long time. He’s twisting his hands together, digging his fingernails into the flesh. Magnus doesn’t like it.

“What are you doing all the way over there?” he asks. Sort of whines, actually. He reaches out a hand for him, but Alec shifts away minutely.

“Watching over you,” he says. 

“You can watch over me from here,” Magnus says, patting the bed beside him with a shaky hand.

“Is that what you want?” Alec asks, scanning him with his dark eyes. Normally, Magnus is pretty good at reading Alec, but right now he’s having a hard time, and that unsettles him, like the very air is shifting.

What he really wants is for Alec to touch him. He feels unmoored—he’s felt unmoored since losing his magic, sort of fragile and hollow, like the slightest touch would crumple him inwards.

And yet, he needs Alec to touch him.

He needs Alec to touch him, but he still doesn’t know how to ask for it—especially not now, cracked open as he is. Magnus thinks it might just break him completely if Alec doesn’t want to. 

When he doesn’t answer, Alec takes it as a _no_ and shifts away again, hunching in on himself. “You’re not in pain, are you? You’d tell me if you were?”

_Kiss me_ , Magnus thinks. _I need to know you still want to, even now. Even when I’m like this._

_“Alexander.”_ His voice cracks.

Alec’s gaze snaps back up, startled and questioning. His voice is tentative. “Magnus?”

_(How do you ask someone to touch you?_

_“Touch me,” he might say, and Alec would ask, “why?” and Magnus would say—_

_“Because I feel physical again when you do.”)_

“Touch me,” Magnus begs.

Alec’s expression snaps cleanly, and that— that’s definitely guilt— but he does as Magnus asks, reaches out to cradle his jaw in a broad warm palm, runs a gentle thumb over his lips like he thinks Magnus has been put back together out of crepe paper and glue, liable to tear at the drag of his fingertips.

And Magnus can’t take much more of being treated like he’s fragile, however accurate that may be. He needs Alec to press his care and desire into him, bruise him with it, or else he might forget it exists once Alec’s hands move away.

He seizes Alec’s wrist in one still-shaky hand, tugs him closer by it. “Please,” he begs again, and God he hates begging, “Alexander—”

Each second that passes is reminding him, again, what he lost, the absence of his magic driven in incrementally like a cold knife between his ribs.

He drags Alec closer by his wrist, fingers pressed to his pulse-point, and feels how it beats faster, _alive alive alive—_

Alec’s magic had hurt, but it had felt—real. He had felt a part of the earth again.

“Magnus—”

Now he feels weightless. Transparent.

“Touch me. Please. You won’t hurt me.”

As though he’s just been waiting for that confirmation, Alec surges toward him, climbing into bed so that he can gather Magnus into his arms, press them tight together. His grip is warm and solid against the slippery coldness of Magnus’s body, and Magnus burrows into his chest, pressing his forehead into the soft material of Alec’s sweater.

“I’m sorry,” Alec whispers, “I shouldn’t have let you— my magic—”

“Shhh,” Magnus hushes, slipping his cold hands up under Alec’s shirt. He’s always cold these days, even with the duvet pulled over him. “It was my choice.”

Alec’s hands dance over his shoulder blades as if scrabbling for purchase in a storm. He pulls Magnus tighter before Magnus can even ask for it. “I—” he swallows—“I thought I would lose you.”

“You didn’t,” Magnus assures him, voice quiet.

Alec pulls him up the bed to meet his gaze, and Magnus wants to flinch away because he recognizes the look in his eyes, that pained longing. He’s felt it every damn day for weeks, even though he’s had Alec right in front of him.

“I won’t,” Alec says, and it sounds like a promise. His grip slides from Magnus’s shoulders to cradle his face, and he looks at him so intensely Magnus feels it like a form of touch itself. “I _won’t_.”

The weight of it sinks into Magnus’s chest, equally grounding and suffocating. It’s all he can do to stare back at him, try to promise Alec something that he’s not sure he can promise himself.

“Magnus, you—” Alec swallows the words instantly like he regrets even voicing them, then looks into Magnus’s eyes again and nods to himself at whatever he sees there, summoning his resolve. “You didn’t _have_ to do that.”

“Do… what?”

“Use my magic.” Alec’s voice is gathering strength now, his hands are like weights holding Magnus to the earth’s surface. “Those demons—they were tough, but we would have handled them eventually. No one even got killed fighting them. We could have just continued on as we were, banishing them as they cropped up, and it probably would have been fine. You didn’t have to—” he swallows hard “—hurt yourself.”

It ends in a question.

Magnus swallows. A series of denials flickers across his tongue: _I didn’t know the magic would be that harmful. I had to solve the problem when a solution presented itself. I knew it could hurt me, but I thought it was worth it to protect you._

All reasonable explanations, all lies.

The memory of Alec cradling his delirious, bleeding body flickers through his mind. Alec doesn’t deserve these hollow evasions.

But Magnus isn’t sure the truth is much more merciful.

“I—” he chokes on the words instantly, voice cracking. “Alec, I—”

His broken attempts at an explanation clarify things for Alec as easily as would pouring his heart out. Alec closes his eyes, brow creasing in pain. _“Magnus—”_

Magnus leans in to kiss the words out of his mouth.

Alec makes a quiet sound against him, a sort of half-hearted protest— _no, we weren’t finished talking_ —but then he’s kissing Magnus back, on his lips, his eyelids, his forehead, his cheeks, his nose.

Magnus needs this touch, needs it like he needs magic—both intrinsic, vital parts of his being preventing him from dissipating into the air. He hums as he leans in to Alec’s lips, hands still pressed to the warmth of him, and it would almost feel normal, comfortable, if it weren’t for his heart palpitating in his chest.

Alec’s hands are still wrapped around his jaw, and he pulls Magnus in closer, presses them together. “I’m not letting you out of my sight now, I hope you know that,” he says, the lightest possible incarnation of the yawning gulf of horror Magnus can sense opening within his ribcage. “We’re talking about this later.”

Magnus hums noncommittally, unable to bridge the divide between how grateful he is that Alec’s still holding him, and how absolutely certain he is that he’ll lose that the instant he tries to talk about any of this.

The truth, he thinks, will come soon enough. For now, there’s only his magic-less body, and Alec’s body solid against his, and the weight of Magnus’s weaknesses hanging in the air between them. For now, Magnus is going to savor this.

There’ll be plenty of time later to let it fall apart.

At first, Alec doesn’t think they’re going to talk about it.

Sitting at the breakfast table the next day—hands intertwined, ankles intertwined, needing the contact—it seems like everything will just shift back into unsettled normalcy. Magnus picks at his French toast, avoiding Alec’s gaze. He’s wearing a sweater again despite the warmth of the morning sun. His fingers are cold in Alec’s grasp.

Alec’s going to ask, once he’s given Magnus a few days to recover. He needs to ask. But that doesn’t mean he can force Magnus to answer honestly.

“I—” Magnus begins, stops. Takes a long sip of his coffee. He still won’t meet Alec’s eyes. “I have something I need to say to you. Something you deserve to hear.”

He pulls his hand from Alec’s, disentangles their legs, and Alec misses him instantly.

“You were right,” Magnus says into his plate. “I didn’t need to end the fight that way. I wanted to help—I… sympathized with the demons’ plight, I suppose…” he plays with his ear “—but also, I—knew that your magic was dangerous to me, I mean how could it not be—I wielded it anyway partly because I wanted to put the demons out of their misery and partly because it felt, um—good. To be in pain, instead of just being—” he waves a vague hand “—empty.”

This is a feeling Alec’s intimately acquainted with, the urge to fill the void in his chest with blood. He reaches out to take Magnus’s hand, but Magnus shifts away again.

“And if the angelic magic did me in,” Magnus continues, very quietly, “well. That might not be so bad, either.”

Alec sits very still for a moment, taking this in. It’s exactly what he expected, and still somehow so much worse to hear aloud.

Magnus laughs harshly. “Well, I suppose that’s all out on the table now. I wanted to— be okay, for you, but. You saw how that turned out. Anyways, I felt that you deserved the truth, after how I got after you about honesty. So if you wanted to leave, I wouldn’t—”

He stands up to flee the table, but Alec beats him to it, lunging to his feet and seizing Magnus’s wrist before he can pull it away again. Instead of letting him leave Alec reels Magnus in until he can pull him into a hug, holding him tight. Magnus struggles against him for a second before going boneless.

“I’m not leaving you,” Alec tells him, breathless as he buries his nose into Magnus’s hair. “Not ever.”

“That’s not a promise you can make,” Magnus protests, but he tucks his face into Alec’s shoulder anyway.

“It is,” Alec says firmly, desperate to make him believe it—before an unsettling thought swirls into his stomach. He feels almost uprooted by it, this insecurity. “Unless, you— unless _you_ wanted to leave.”

Magnus pulls away and looks up at him. “What?”

“Magnus, you—” God, Alec _hates_ putting these feelings on him. But— “You wouldn’t even be _in_ this situation if it wasn’t for me. I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted—needed—to leave. To protect yourself.” Alec’s not sure he would survive it, but he’s also not sure how much longer he can survive Magnus feeling like the world is crushing him.

“There’s no protecting myself from you, Alexander,” Magnus says, almost to himself. Then, louder, “It was my decision to make. You didn’t force me to do it.”

“But it’s not just that.” Alec really doesn’t know why he’s arguing this point. “You’ve dealt with so much because of me. Sometimes I wonder if— if you’d be better off if we’d never met.”

Magnus looks wary. “Do you… wish that were the case?”

“No! Of course not.” The mere thought shears Alec’s heart in two.

“Then don’t tell me how I’d be better off.”

Alec really doesn’t want this to turn into a fight. Not while they’re both still so wired. “I just don’t want you to be hurt anymore. Especially not because of me.”

Magnus’s expression softens a little, though he still seems like he’s waiting for a blow. He takes Alec’s hand. “Come sit down with me.”

Alec follows him to the couch, where they sit, knees lightly touching.

“I suppose it’s now blatantly obvious that I’m not exactly _swimming along_ without magic,” Magnus begins, his tone as self-effacing as it always is when he talks about what really hurts him, “but don’t take that to mean that I would change _us._ ” He squeezes Alec’s hand. “I’ve never, not once, regretted falling in love with you, Alexander. Even if I could go back to the start, and make a different choice, I would not give you up. Do not ask me to.”

Alec doesn’t know how to speak around the tightness in his chest. He brings Magnus’s hand to his lips instead, kissing his knuckles.

“We’ve had more trials than a young relationship should,” Magnus continues quietly. “A few of them were your fault. A few were mine. But many were outside our control. Things I would have been involved in whether I’d met you or not. You don’t have to shoulder the blame for everything.”

“But this is—your _magic_ ,” Alec protests. It’s a hurt so big it pushes everything else out of view. “And you’re not okay, Magnus, please don’t go back to pretending that you are. I guess I’ve known for a while that you weren’t, but I didn’t realize—” he drags a hand over his face “—how _bad_ —”

Magnus sighs. “In retrospect, trying to conceal that from you was a fool’s errand. But, well—” he laughs humorlessly “—nobody wants a _broken_ boyfriend, do they?”

“I do,” Alec says before he can think about how it sounds, “and you’re not broken.”

“I am, actually, but I appreciate the faith.”

“Don’t say that. We’ll figure this out. We’re going to get your magic back.”

“Oh, really?” Magnus bristles with sudden anger. “And just how are we going to do that?”

“I don’t know, but we’ll figure it out—”

“‘We’ll figure it out?’” Magnus repeats, pulling his hand from Alec’s grasp. It still startles Alec, how quickly Magnus’s moods can turn now, even though he knows it’s his own fault for pushing at a touchy subject. “Exactly how are we going to ‘figure it out,’ Alexander?”

A tear slides down his cheek, and then another, and Alec’s startled to realize this is the first time Magnus has cried over his magic. It’s been weeks, and he hasn’t cried.

Or maybe Alec just hasn’t seen it.

Magnus’s tears are coming more quickly now, the corners of his eyes tinting red. It’s a horrible experience, watching Magnus cry—like watching a piece of the sky fall to earth. Like watching the stars bleed.

Alec had once promised himself that he would never let Magnus bleed again.

How could he have failed so spectacularly?

Magnus is still just looking at him, waiting for an answer he doesn’t think he’ll get. _How can we possibly figure this out?_

“Together,” Alec says.

A sob breaks loose from Magnus’s throat, and Alec has to pull him back into his arms where he belongs. He tugs Magnus down onto the couch, holds him close while he cries in heaving gasps that seem like they should shake him apart, and wishes, not for the first time, that he could take the magic out of his own body and put it in Magnus’s.

But life could never be as simple as that.

Instead it’s this: the splintered midmorning light. Magnus’s body against him, cooler from the loss of his magic but still warm, still there, still alive. The weight of his tears soaking into Alec’s shirt. The easier weight of the promises they’ve made to each other.

It takes a long time for Magnus to finally still against him, for the roiling emotion within him to finally quiet to Alec’s touch. When it does, Magnus lifts his head to look at him, and his tentative smile is like the sun peeking through clouds: more radiant for its absence. Alec can’t help but smile back at him.

Magnus raises an eyebrow, teases, “Like what you see, Alexander?”

“Always,” Alec says, and something in Magnus Alec hadn’t realized was tense eases at the statement.

Alec isn’t naïve enough to think he’s okay now, that one moment of catharsis can stitch together weeks’ worth of slowly tearing seams. He’s still thinking of those demons, the cold longing of them, how they dove into magic that burned them to nothingness. He’s still thinking of Magnus’s gaze as he watched them.

Alec’s known for a long time that Magnus is a hard person to hold. He’s so _much_ —so much power, so much energy, so much brilliance, so much love. He shines so bright he’s hard to even look at directly, never mind try to hold in one set of hands.

Now that Magnus himself is losing his grip on all of that, well.

Alec will just have to hold him a little bit tighter.

He reaches out to run his fingers through Magnus’s hair, cradling his head between his palms. Magnus leans into the touch, humming, his eyes slipping shut. He relaxes into Alec’s body, stretching loose and languid until they’re pressed tight along every inch and Magnus seems to have recovered just a bit of the ease and grace lost to him with his magic.

Magnus leans up to kiss him, just soft, light, Alec’s hands still in his hair holding him in place. His hand comes up to wrap around Alec’s wrist, and Alec’s sure Magnus can feel the way his pulse picks up, thumping against his fingertips. He wonders if Magnus knows how the simple touch makes his heart feel like it’s going to burst into Magnus’s hands, how the brush of his lips—salty, still, with his tears—as he deepens the kiss makes something so large and bright grow in his chest that he doesn’t think even the two of them would be able to contain it.

From the way Magnus looks at him as he pulls away, Alec thinks maybe he does know.

“Thank you,” Magnus says, cupping Alec’s cheek in one hand, “for holding onto me.”

Alec takes that hand in his own. “You never have to thank me for that.”

**Author's Note:**

> partially inspired by [‘The Touch’ by Anne Sexton](http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/anne_sexton/poems/18208). particularly this stanza: 
> 
> _Then all this became history.  
>  Your hand found mine.  
> Life rushed to my fingers like a blood clot.  
> Oh, my carpenter,  
> the fingers are rebuilt.  
> They dance with yours.  
> They dance in the attic and in Vienna.  
> My hand is alive all over America.  
> Not even death will stop it,  
> death shedding her blood.  
> Nothing will stop it, for this is the kingdom  
> and the kingdom come._
> 
> also sort of inspired by ['never let me go' by yiqie](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23030551), an absolutely incredible _Untamed_ fic. it's not a strong enough inspiration to warrant the tag, but i still wanted to share it with you all - def check that fic out if you're in that fandom too
> 
> thanks for reading this rather long thing! i hope you enjoyed it :)
> 
> i’m also on [tumblr](https://cuubism.tumblr.com/) ⭐
> 
> also! please please look at [this glorious artwork](https://chibi-tsukiko.tumblr.com/post/630246118649987072/evil-squad) @chibi-tsukiko made for this fic, it's so beautiful, i'm cry 🥺

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[fanmix] Cradling The Sun](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26158531) by [faejilly (jillyfae)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jillyfae/pseuds/faejilly)




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